Medicare Wants Your Opinion on Covering Gender Reassignment Surgery

The agency was giving the public 30 days to offer their opinions on whether Medicare should cover surgery for transgender patients with coverage.

Diane Anderson-Minshall

Diane Anderson-Minshall is the CEO of Pride Media, and editorial director of The Advocate, Out, and Plus magazine. She's the winner of numerous awards from GLAAD, the NLGJA, WPA, and was named to Folio's Top Women in Media list. She and her co-pilot of 30 years, transgender journalist Jacob Anderson-Minshall penned several books including Queerly Beloved: A Love Across Genders.

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Diane Anderson-Minshall

March 29 2013 2:01 PM EST

November 17 2015 5:28 AM EST

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UPDATE: The Department of Health and Human Services has rescinded its call for public comment. Read the latest report here.

The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which runs the federal government's national insurance program, is reconsidering whether or not it should cover gender reassignment surgery (often called sex reassignment surgery) for transgender people who have Medicare. It has offered the public 30 days to offer opinions on the matter. Since around 48 million people are covered by Medicare, if the agency decides to allow coverage, the change would have a significant impact on transgender people in the U.S.

This official reconsideration of coverage began yesterday and goes for 29 more days in which the public can comment.

The center states that it "considers all public comments, and is particularly interested in clinical studies and other scientific information relevant to the topic under review. Surgical Treatment for Gender Identity Disorder is currently noncovered under the Medicare Part A and Part B programs. The existing policy, which became effective in 1981, states that transsexual surgery is considered experimental. Please note that we are making an administrative change to the NCD title under this reconsideration to reflect current medical terminology. The new title for Section 140.3 will be Surgical Treatment for Gender Identity Disorder."