US policy shift - Dept. Of Health and Human Services defines gender as a person's biological sex.

[yourethecomebackkid]

Love how they can’t help
themselves from framing it as an attack but this appears significant - apnews.com/bae1456be55955aab379a3541391f93b?utm_campaign=SocialFlow&utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=AP

‘The Department of Health and Human Services said it will enforce sex discrimination protections “according to the plain meaning of the word ‘sex’ as male or female and as determined by biology.” This rewrites an Obama-era regulation that sought a broader understanding shaped by a person’s internal sense of being male, female, neither or a combination.‘

It also covers all LGBTQ pwople, so while you might think this is a great thing it also gives doctors the right to refuse medical treatment to a lesbian woman who is laying dying on the table after being beaten up because of the doctors religious belief.

Can you explain this a bit more. Can doctors in the US refuse to give life saving treatment to people who turn up at hospital with health insurance?

@lindaleedanvers

How would the doctor know their patient was a lesbian in your scenario?

The doctor does not even need to know they only have to suspect that they are a lesbian so a gender non-conformist woman with short hair who is actually in a hetrosexual relationship with children but looks like a butch lesbian could be refused treatment.

The law states that they dont need evidence of their sexuality only a belief that they are. So it's totally subjective and down to the doctor in question they can suspect someone is gay and refuse to treat them. That is all they need, a suspicion.

Had a quick look online and it would appear that as LGBT community are not protected I. the same way as in UK this will mean that Insurance providers can deny cover for
GR surgery as can medical professionals. Not sure about other treatment such as emergency medicine. Us Healthcare!

@334bu yes they can, if the doctor has a legitimate religious objection to treating that patient because they appear to be gay or they suspect that they are trans then they can refuse to treat them even if they have insurance.

If I was an American doctor prior to this with a religious objection to treating gay people, would that have been seen as legitimate? Or is it part of this new ruling?

Under Obama's law the doctor had to treat them regardless to any objections, now Trump has removed that so doctors can freely discriminate.

So as i said you can have a woman who looks like a butch lesbian but is married with children involved in a car accident and because the doctor thinks she looks like a lesbian refuses to treat her and lets her die instead.

They won't keep there job long if that very stretched logic scenario actually ever happens. Good on the USA for defining sex as biological a huge step forward in protecting women and girls.

The new rule also provides a blanket exemption to health providers who refuse to provide abortion services because of their religious beliefs.

@InfiniteSheldon they can't sack them, as they are following the law. The family can't sue them for wrongful death as they were following the law. In fact the new law screws over the LGBT community and anyone who does not conform to gender norms and could be suspected of being LGBT even if they are not.

I don't think so @LindaLeeDanvers unless you think lesbian women are male? Why wouldn't they just treat her according to her sex like any other woman?

Without further information from a reputable source I have to say that I believe you to not only be scaremongering, Linda, but smearing people of faith. I can’t see why any religious doctor would specifically refuse a lesbian treatment, unless you’re talking about some sort of fertility treatment, which wouldn’t be an emergency.

@RuffleCrow the law allows doctors to refuse to treat any member of the LGBT community or someone they perceive to be a member of that community on religious grounds, it is not just trans people this change in the law affects it affects sexual orientation as well.

It is a wide ranging law that he has rolled back that protected the whole LGBT community, So doctor's can refuse to treat lesbians and gay men and bisexuals as well as trans people.

Is that really true? That in the US doctors can refuse to treat people who are dying? For religious reasons because they don't agree with their lifestyle?

As for the abortion bit, our own 1967 abortion act also contains a clause where staff can refuse to treat someone on grounds of religious belief.

The American system is incoherent and broken. All of it. There is nothing to celebrate because they give with one hand and take with the other.
They need to start over and model a new system.

imo, a system that has no clear rule over whether a patient must be given life saving treatment by the first available medic is not fit for purpose.

Indeed RuffleCrow
Which is why so many women can't get the perfectly legal morning after pill or abortions via some GPs or chemists if they claim it's against their religious wishes.

Does the USA health care system operate on the basis that doctors don't have to treat someone if they don't like the look of them?

If true, this just shows what a toxic trojan horse transgenderism is, in both directions. There's a simplicity and truth to being LGB that gained us widespread support in the past few decades, even amongst republicans and conservatives. Sadly transgenderism is based on misinformation and lies and as such undermines our credibility with those right-wingers who are a) capable of logical thought and b) perhaps quietly looking for a way to backtrack on their previous uncharacteristic liberalism.

I came on here to look for discussion about this because I don't understand what it means at all.

www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/trump-lgbt-healthcare-hhs-aca-section-1557-a9564131.html

"Invoking “religious freedom”, the Department of Health and Human Services had revised a rule under the Affordable Care Act to revert to “the government’s interpretation of sex discrimination according to the plain meaning of the word ‘sex’ as male or female and as determined by biology”. The changes revoke discrimination protections on the basis of ”gender identity” and sex, including patients seeking an abortion."

@LindaLeeDanvers

Hi, this a copy of the press release from the department of HHS

www.hhs.gov/about/news/2020/06/12/hhs-finalizes-rule-section-1557-protecting-civil-rights-healthcare.html

It is referenced in this guardian article about the roll back of transgender rights. www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jun/12/trump-transgender-lgbt-healthcare-protections

From reading the press release I can't see how this legislation protected gay people. It references a redefinition of "sex discrimination to include termination of pregnancy and gender identity, which it defined as “one’s internal sense of gender, which may be male, female, neither, or a combination of male and female.”

I don't see how this protected gay people, would you mind explaining? I am aware that gay and transgender people do not have the same legal protections but I don't understand how this redefinition of sex protected gay people from being refused medical treatment for being gay?

I note that this reversal to whatever "sex discrimination" was defined as previously also removes protection from discrimination due to termination of pregnancy. I find it interesting that this is not mentioned by the guardian nor were the changes to what I presume were obligations under race/national origin.

Finally Linda, if you are American would you mind telling me if press releases from HSS are partisan or if they are meant to be neutral. It's hard to tell from a British perspective.

Thanks and apologies for the @ if you don't like it.

So on what basis would they be allowed to not perform an abortion? Is it because they are against abortion in general? Where does gender identity or discrimination come in?

Sorry if it's a daft question

This is interesting. So a Doctor wouldn’t be sacked? Or the nurses? If a lesbian was dying. What would they write as the cause of the death on the death certificate?.

This is horrendous!
What about a nurses/Dr duty of care are they not legally bound by that? like they would be even if off duty (UK).

Caly I think it meant that you couldn't discriminated against because you needed a termination but that doesn't necessarily mean that you would get a termination.

Although honestly I don't really understand and there is the whole issue of state vs federal laws.

Thanks Dolorsit
So hard to understand and I hope our NHS doesn't follow the US