VA Won’t See New Patients for Gender Dysphoria
In a press release on Monday the Department of Veterans Affairs declared that veterans seeking treatment for their gender dysphoria are out of luck.
by Alyssa Steinsiek
After a confusing weekend, the Department of Veterans Affairs has confirmed that they will no longer offer treatment for gender dysphoria to veterans who aren’t already receiving gender-affirming care through the department.
It’s been a difficult year for trans service members and their families. One of former president Joe Biden’s final acts in office was to sign a National Defense Authorization Act that denied coverage for gender-affirming care through TRICARE, service members’ primary healthcare insurance provider, the first federally enacted anti-LGBTQ+ law since the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act.
Then, immediately after taking office and during a whirlwind of anti-trans executive orders being issued, Trump declared that transgender Americans would no longer be allowed to serve in the military. Early this month, the Pentagon issued new directives to identify and fire service members who have, or have a history of, gender dysphoria starting next month. The blatantly discriminatory firing of more than 15,000 service members, many of whom likely occupy key positions in the hierarchy of the United States military, will certainly destabilize an armed forces that’s already struggling to meet recruitment quotas.
Whether or not you see that as a silver lining, it’s hard to celebrate more than 15,000 unemployed transgender people. That ban is currently blocked by a federal court order, but it remains to be seen if the Trump administration and the Department of Defense will obey the courts.
Now, after previously denying a change in policy, the VA has confirmed that they will no longer be treating new patients for gender dysphoria. They are rescinding Directive 1341, which provided detailed guidance for the kinds of care veterans can receive at a VA facility, and refusing to provide gender-affirming care for any veterans who aren’t already receiving treatment for gender dysphoria.
VA Secretary Doug Collins said in a press release on Monday, “I mean no disrespect to anyone, but VA should not be focused on helping Veterans attempt to change their sex. The vast majority of Veterans and Americans agree, and that is why this is the right decision … [if] veterans want to attempt to change their sex, they can do so on their own dime.”
This seems especially buffoonish coming from the organization that, need I remind you all, spends tens of millions of dollars annually on dick pills for troops. Not that I have anything against the concept of providing truly gluttonous amounts of Viagra for our fighting men and women… or whatever… but it just seems a tad hypocritical, considering trans troops and veterans cost the government barely a fraction of the money they spend on those dick pills.
The VA assures that non-GAC healthcare for LGBTQ+ veterans won’t be affected by these changes, but that’s cold comfort for the people who sacrificed years of their lives to earn lifetime care from the fed, only to be told now that they can’t be treated for a specific disorder—their doctors told that they cannot practice certain kinds of medicine and provide appropriate treatment to their patients—because of an ongoing culture war between the fascists in power and a minority group that constitutes maybe one percent of the entire national populace. To say nothing of the fact that LGBTQ+ veterans have a higher rate of suicide than the general veteran population, which is already higher than that of the civilian population.
I would advise trans veterans to prepare for the goal posts to be moved even further in the coming days.
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