Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb (R) this week signed legislation essentially banning “gender-affirming” care — leftist-speak for puberty blockers, hormone therapies, and top and bottom surgeries — for minors, following the state House and Senate approving the measure.
Senate Bill 480 specifically prohibits physicians from performing such procedures on minors.
A summary of the bill states that it “prohibits a physician or other practitioner from: (1) knowingly providing gender transition procedures to an individual who is less than 18 years of age (minor); and (2) aiding or abetting another physician or practitioner in the provision of gender transition procedures to a minor” with limited medical exceptions.
The legislation specifically defines gender reassignment surgery as:
Any medical or surgical service that seeks to surgically alter or remove healthy physical or anatomical characteristics or features that are typical for the individual’s sex, in order to instill or create physiological or anatomical characteristics that resemble a sex different from the individual’s sex, including genital gender reassignment surgery or non genital gender reassignment surgery knowingly performed for the purpose of assisting an individual with a gender transition.
Surgical procedures banned for minors in the context of “gender-affirmation” include orchiectomies, penectomies, vaginoplasties, clitoroplasties, vulvoplasties, and more.
However, there appears to be limited exceptions for such procedures, including hormone therapy and puberty blockers, for individuals with a “verifiable disorder of sex development.”
The legislation goes into effect July 1 and comes after Holcomb indicated to reporters on Tuesday that he was unsure of which way he would go.
“I wanted to dig deep,” he explained. “I’ve told some people very close to me, this is clear as mud. There’s some vagueness to it. So, I want to make sure I completely understand it … I wanted to get a full picture of it.”
However, the Republican signed it into law on Wednesday.
“Permanent gender-changing surgeries with lifelong impacts and medically prescribed preparation for such a transition should occur as an adult, not as a minor,” Holcomb stated.
“A child cannot consent to irreversible sex change surgery, and Indiana will no longer allow children to take dangerous drugs with long-term consequences like puberty blockers and hormone therapies in the name of extreme gender theories,” Sen. Mike Braun (R-IN) said on social media, adding that these children must receive compassion and “mental health help rather than dangerous, un-tested, unapproved drugs and irreversible surgeries”:
These kids are clearly having a hard time, and we need to give them compassion and mental health help rather than dangerous, un-tested, unapproved drugs and irreversible surgeries.
— Senator Mike Braun (@SenatorBraun) April 5, 2023
Indiana follows states such as Florida, after the Sunshine State’s medical boards voted to ban so-called gender-affirming treatments for minors in November.
Last June, Florida Medicaid completed a report requested by the Secretary of the Agency for Health Care Administration (AHCA), finding that “gender-affirming” treatments — including surgeries and hormone therapies — are “experimental and investigational.”
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