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A North Dakota A judge has upheld the state’s ban on gender-affirming care for children, dealing a blow to families who have to travel out of state to get medical treatment they say is vital to their children’s well-being.
District Judge Jackson Lofgren said in her ruling Wednesday that the law discriminates based on age and medical purposes, not gender, and that there was little evidence to support that. Legislature The law was passed for “a blatant discriminatory purpose”. He also mentioned various concerns and ongoing debates over the medical treatments involved.
“The evidence presented at trial establishes that there is a legitimate concern about the ability of minors to understand and appreciate the long-term consequences of practices prohibited by health care law,” the judge wrote. He also said he did not believe the law violates the state constitution.
The decision means that parents who decide to seek gender-affirming medical care for their children after the state’s ban takes effect in April 2023 will need to do so out of state.
“This decision is devastating for transgender youth and their families in North Dakota. The evidence in this case was overwhelming: This law causes real harm, deprives families of their constitutional rights, and deprives young people of the medical care they need to thrive,” Jess Braverman, legal director of Gender Justice, the gender equity nonprofit representing the plaintiffs, said in a statement.
republican State Representative Bill Tweet, who introduced the legislation, said he was pleased with the decision.
“This is a law that needs to be in place. We need to protect our youth and that was the entire goal of this thing from the beginning,” the tweet said.
The lawsuit was brought by several affected families and a pediatric endocrinologist, but the judge dismissed some of their claims and left only the physician as plaintiff.
Nearly half of US states, almost all of which have entirely Republican-led governments, have banned gender-affirming care for minors. North Dakota law makes it a misdemeanor for a health care provider to prescribe or give hormone treatments or puberty blockers to a transgender child. It also makes it a crime to perform gender-confirmation surgery on a minor.
Supporters of the law said it would protect children from the irreversible effects of treatment and surgery, although such surgeries were never available in the state. Opponents said the law harms transgender children by denying them vital medical care.
Although the law exempts children who were already receiving treatment before North Dakota’s ban took effect, attorneys for the suing families said providers blocked it because they found the law vague and didn’t want to risk it. This caused families to miss work and school so they could travel minnesota For treatment.
The judge later ruled that those children could receive any medical care they were receiving before the law took effect, although the decision was not sufficient as a final decision to satisfy attorneys for the health care organizations. His Wednesday decision cited the law and his previous findings in granting a request that those children continue to be treated.
There were at least two pediatric endocrinologists providing gender-affirming care in North Dakota before the ban.
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in June that states can ban gender-affirming medical care for transgender minors.
At least 27 states have adopted laws restricting or restricting the care.