Like many other states, Montana has a proposed bill in their legislature that targets transgender youth. SB 99 seeks to prohibit youth from accessing several kinds of gender affirming care.
SB 99 would ban gender-affirming top and bottom surgeries, as well as any practices that might “aid or abet” a gender-affirming procedure for anyone under the age of 18, except for surgeries done on individuals with differences of sex development (which is another big problem: consent to not have surgery is often denied to individuals with DSDs.)
Proposed consequences include:
- loss of medical licenses for a minimum of 2 years
- lawsuits with damages for even “threatening” a gender affirming procedure
- individuals may submit claims until the minor is 38. Thirty-eight. Montana caps medical malpractice claims at five years* post-incident for other procedures, not 20+ (*unless the provider did not disclose information about possible risks.)
SB 99 relies on the same tired and INCORRECT arguments that we’ve all heard before and specifically aims to deny bodily autonomy to transgender youth. Youth are not “subjected” to gender affirming procedures, they and their families CHOOSE their care pathways.
Tell the Montana legislature that SB 99 is a misguided, scientifically inaccurate, and bigoted bill.
The Montana Human Rights Network has sponsored a letter through FastAction and provides suggested letter text that you can personalize.
Here’s how we personalized our letter (it’s a version of our letter to the Florida Boards of Medicine). You are welcome to use or adapt this text as you see fit. Personal statements of how you are connected to gender affirming care and how you are connected to Montana are encouraged. You do need to submit demographic information to use FastAction, but you may use an alias.
I urge you to vote no on SB 99, which would interfere with families making private medical decisions with their trusted medical providers.
The bill as written is not based on the current standards of care for transgender youth as agreed upon by the majority of the relevant medical and professional organizations, including the:
American Academy of Pediatrics
The Endocrine Society
The Pediatric Endocrine Society
American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
American Academy of Family Physicians
American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists
American College of Physicians
American Medical Association
American Osteopathic Association
American Psychiatric Association
American Public Health Association
World Professional Association For Transgender Health
The body of evidence supporting gender affirming care for youth with gender dysphoria is strong and growing. The assertion that gender affirming care is extreme, rushed, is not well understood by those who seek it, or that there is a high rate of regret is scientifically unsupported and simply untrue. While there is growing interest in initializing gender affirming care for youth, genital surgeries remain unavailable before the age of 18. Some transgender youth are able to obtain mastectomies and mammoplasties, but so do cisgender youth.
Proposed bill SB 99 prohibiting gender affirming procedures will harm Montana youth, and denies Montana families the right to make healthcare decisions in private consultation with their doctors. It is in opposition to existing guidelines and clinical knowledge. 29 major medical organizations support gender affirming care as medically necessary.
I urge you to vote no on SB 99.
QueerDoc and Montana
We were briefly open in Montana in early 2022. Unfortunately, regulations made it difficult to stay open. We are hoping to re-open in Montana soon, and we welcome youth and adult patients. We are committed to providing gender affirming care, to fighting against medical discrimination, and to advocating against discriminatory laws, especially in the states where we practice.
Stay in touch with us and get notified when we are practicing in Montana again!
