The Family Research Council wants you to help Donald Trump wreck LGBTQ healthcare

While Donald Trump's latest mess has been sucking up attention for the past few days, anti-LGBTQ hate group the Family Research Council is busy attempting to gain support for his attack on LGBTQ health via an awful policy change to the Affordable Care Act. This change would reverse healthcare protections for the LGBTQ community and women seeking abortions.

From the FRC blog:

Do you ever wish that government officials had to listen to what you have to say? 

Comment here and they must review your comment. No, really, it’s required by federal law. 

The Trump administration’s Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is considering a rule making important changes to Section 1557 of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), and is still taking public comments. This rule would protect the conscience rights of people of faith who have a moral objection to performing abortions. It would also undo an Obama-era regulation on Section 1557 that shoehorned “gender identity” into the definition of “sex” (as opposed to meaning just “male” and “female”). 

Here’s what Family Research Council Action said in an alert on this HHS Rule: 

Doctors – and patients – need your help! Here’s how: send a comment to Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar! The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has issued a proposed rule to remove old Obama Administration regulations that would prevent doctors from being able to treat patients based strictly on science, biology, and their medical judgment! 

The old regulation said that “sex” means “gender identity” meaning that if a doctor didn’t affirm a patient's self-identified gender they could be sued for discrimination. Medical judgment and what is best for the patient didn’t matter!

When you click on the words comment here  (which I unlinked), you are invited to submit your name, email address, and a form letter to the Department of Health and Human Services. The form letter contains deceptive talking points about "conscience protections" and the "rights of healthcare providers." Conveniently, it doesn't mention how the policy change would wreak havoc on women's health and the health of the LGBTQ community at large.

ThinkProgress breaks down what the policy change would do:

The Trump administration is trying to roll back the Affordable Care Act’s Health Care Rights Law by eliminating the ban on sex discrimination, which includes discrimination based on gender identity and sex stereotyping. Under this proposed rule, health providers could refuse to treat transgender patients and insurance companies can refuse to cover services they need or charge them a lot more for it. (The sweeping rule goes beyond undermining protections for LGBTQ individuals; for example, it eliminates protections for all patients who have abortions.)

According to the Kaisier Family Foundation, the rule change would be devastating by:

Eliminating the general prohibition on discrimination based on gender identity, as well as specific health insurance coverage protections for transgender individuals; 

Adopting blanket abortion and religious freedom exemptions for health care providers; Eliminating the provision preventing health insurers from varying benefits in ways that discriminate against certain groups, such as people with HIV or LGBTQ people; 

Weakening protections that provide access to interpretation and translation services for individuals with limited English proficiency; Eliminating provisions affirming the right of private individuals to challenge alleged violations of § 1557 in court and to obtain money damages, as well as requirements for covered entities to provide non-discrimination notices and grievance procedures; 

Narrowing the reach of the regulations by only covering specific activities that receive federal funding, but not other operations, of health insurers that are not “principally engaged in the business of providing health care,” and no longer applying the regulations to all HHS-administered programs.

An article in Buzzfeed had this to say:

The move is part of a broader effort under President Donald Trump's administration to undo LGBT and reproductive rights, many of which were created by his predecessor, former president Barack Obama, by asserting that civil rights laws banning “sex” discrimination should be interpreted narrowly. 

"This rule dangerously encourages illegal discrimination, putting the lives of transgender people in jeopardy," Kris Hayashi, executive director at Transgender Law Center, said in a statement calling the draft rule "yet another outright attack from the Trump administration on the health, well-being, and survival of transgender people."

Finally, the Human Rights Campaign said:

Fear of discrimination causes many LGBTQ people to avoid seeking healthcare, and when they do enter care, studies indicate that LGBTQ people are not consistently treated with the respect that all patients deserve. Studies show that 56% of LGB people and 70% of transgender and gender non-conforming people reported experiencing discrimination by healthcare providers -- including refusal of care, harsh language and physical roughness because of their sexual orientation or gender identity. According to a report, 23% of transgender respondents did not see a doctor when they needed to because of fear of being mistreated as a transgender person and a startling 55% of transgender respondents who sought coverage for transition-related surgery were denied. Delay and avoidance of care due to fear of discrimination compounds the significant health disparities experienced by LGBTQ people.

What can we do? Send in comments telling our stories about how the policy change would disrupt our lives. Tell our stories - and I know they are out there - about the problems we've all had when it comes to getting decent healthcare and affirming physicians who will treat us instead of judging us. You can go here to post your comments. And if you need to read more about the possible policy change beforehand, you can go here. 

We have until August 13th. People on our side of the spectrum (such as the American Medical Association and the Administration for Community Living)  have been working to combat policy change ever since it was announced and they have also been encouraging people to send in comments. However, since the Family Research Council has announced this recent effort to have people  unite behind a bad form letter, I think it would be a good idea for us to tell our stories.

Let's at least be clear about this situation. It's not about protecting the "rights" of physicians nor is it about "conscience protections." It's about the deliberate hindering  of decent healthcare for LGBTQs and women seeking abortions.  When it comes to the latter issue, I am sure that there are a lot of voices out there who can vouch for how this policy change is dangerous on that end.

As for the LGBTQ community, this is nothing more than an ugly attempt to keep us from living healthy lives.  And it is deliberate because this is how groups like the Family Research Council operate. They attempt to block us from attaining good health. And then paint us as the "unhealthy and diseased other" whenever their undermining of our health is successful.