The Good Health Project aims to support healthcare professionals who provide gender affirming care with pro bono legal information and education about their rights.
Twenty-seven states have passed bans on trans healthcare for youth. Some states have made it their mission to identify and prosecute providers. The Trump administration is doing everything it can to stop trans youth and trans adults from thriving. One of their routes of oppression is targeting gender affirming care: military personnel can’t access it, Tricare won’t cover it, they’re aiming to ban gender affirming care under Medicaid and Medicare, they are denying affirming healthcare to incarcerated individuals, and the federal government is fighting to withhold grant funding from organizations that offer gender affirming care to youth and adults <19.
The government is attacking us, our communities, our peers, and our work.
Healthcare professionals need your support, too.
The Campaign for Southern Equality has launched a pilot program focused on supporting clinicians through the rapidly changing legal landscape so that they can keep doing this work.
Introducing The Good Health Project
In the current political climate, legal support is central to sustainably providing care. The Good Health Project aims to help clinicians with:
- up to date information about state and federal regulations
- education about their rights
- pro bono legal support
Large institutions have legal departments and teams of lawyers who can help them navigate anti-trans legislation. Large institutions may also decide that providing life-saving health care doesn’t fit their risk profile (as we saw with several large institutions stopping youth care in response to federal executive orders threatening to pull grants BEFORE THEY WERE REQUIRED TO.)
Background reporting on the executive orders targeting trans healthcare:
- Via Erin In the Morning:
- New HHS Directive Cites Anti-LGBTQ+ Hate Groups, Demands Hospitals Stop Trans Youth Care (3/7/25)
- Judge Blocks Trump Trans Ban Nationwide, Slams Reliance On Cass Review (3/5/25)
- More Hospitals Resume Trans Care After Trump’s EO Temporarily Blocked in Court [AZ, VA] (2/19/25)
- Protests Erupt Across US At Hospitals Complying With Trumps Unlawful Under-19 Trans Ban EO (2/5/25)
Independent providers and smaller institutions don’t have these kinds of resources, but decentralizing care is one of the strategies that will help trans people survive, and we need MORE ACCESS, not less. We need more providers with gender affirming care skillsets and we need them to feel safe enough to practice this work.
(Decentralizing care also means DIY. We don’t judge.)
We are dedicated to our work.
But we’ll be honest: one of the things that has helped keep us sustainable is access to legal support. We have been so privileged to have pro bono legal support. We have not received support from The Good Health Project, but we know how important it is for providers to have trusted legal advice. Healthcare clinicians who do gender affirming care and trans healthcare are at risk of fines, losing their licensing, arrest, lawsuits, prosecution (some states make providing gender care a felony!) And we may be personally threatened.
Access to appropriate and affirming healthcare saves trans lives. It can’t get any clearer.
Our response to the 1/25 executive order attacking care to under-19s.
Help The Good Health Project Help Providers.
Donate here.
Related Resources:
Are you a clinician who wants to support their trans and gender diverse patients with an expanded toolset? We teach trans healthcare via QueerCME.
We are frequently asked about financial ways to support us directly. Although we do not currently have a nonprofit partner for our access fund, here are some of our favorite ways to support trans healthcare:
- Just give trans people money. Directly.
- Want to support patients getting care with us? Donate money towards patients receiving care with us via Point of Pride‘s dedicated donation page or text pledge “QUEERDOC” to 44-321.
- Help youth in ban states via the Trans Youth Emergency Project.
- Support trans people who have to travel to access care via Elevated Access.
- GLMA also directly supports healthcare professionals via advocacy.
- Bother your elected officials relentlessly. Tell them that you oppose any and all attempts to criminalize being transgender or criminalizing or restricting access to affirming healthcare.