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October 8, 2024 - 2:00pm
At least 5,747 children underwent gender transition surgeries in the US from 2019 to 2023, according to insurance data obtained by the medical watchdog group Do No Harm.
The data relies on insurance claims and therefore excludes surgeries paid for out-of-pocket and those performed at institutions which don’t report claims, meaning it significantly underestimates the prevalence of these surgeries. Nonetheless, it reveals an enormous industry and undermines activists’ claims that such surgeries for minors are exceedingly rare.
Covered surgeries include mastectomies, breast construction, facial surgeries, and genital surgeries. Only two states, Alaska and Wyoming, had zero insurance claims filed for paediatric gender surgeries from 2019 to 2023, and even these states had patients receiving puberty blockers or cross-sex hormones under the age of 18, as did every other US state.
Some states served as hot spots, including California, which had at least 1,359 surgeries. Meanwhile, New York had 616; and Pennsylvania, Oregon and Massachusetts all had more than 300 paediatric gender surgeries during the five year period. Several red states served as the location for surprisingly high numbers of surgeries, such as Texas where there were more than 200, and Florida where there were more than 100.
A 2022 Reuters report, which also relied on insurance data, found that gender-affirming mastectomies and breast construction surgeries performed on children aged 13-17 increased from 238 in 2019 to 282 in 2021. At the same time, there was a steep increase in the prescription of puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones and a surge in gender dysphoria diagnoses, Reuters found. But the new data from Do No Harm reveals that the industry is larger than previously known, and it’s quickly growing despite state-level restrictions. The reported surgeries brought in more than $108 million during the five year period.
The database also tracked insurance claims for puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones. Do No Harm found that more than 8,500 patients underwent hormones or puberty blockers, comprising more than 62,000 total prescriptions and costing more than $11 million. Hormones are relatively affordable and can be easily obtained without insurance, so these findings represent a very conservative estimate.
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SubscribeThe good news is that The American Society of Plastic Surgeons has announced they will not perform surgeries on children 17-13. They cite the lack of high quality studies.
There have been plenty of countries throughout history where child castration has been a normal and uncontroversial part of life for thousands of years. The reasons varied – some wanted court eunuchs, some wanted effeminate male prostitutes, some thought that if a boy was destined to become a monk, then his parents were doing a good deed by removing a source of temptations.
My fear that this will, under Democratic rule, become a normal and uncontrovesial part of life in America – and potentially stay that way for the next thousand years – is part of the reason why I can look at all the chaos and corruption surrounding Donald Trump and still say: I am less afraid of this guy than of his opponents, and any true patriot should be excited to vote for him. If a Trump win leads to the country splitting up into smaller pieces like Yugoslavia, then so be it – better that than being a country where child mutilation is normalized like in Rome and medieval China.
I’ve written about this in more detail here:
https://twilightpatriot.substack.com/p/fear-courage-the-fourth-of-july-and
I think you’re right. It’s remarkable – and an utterly damning comment on the state of US elite culture – that Trump appears increasingly to be the ‘safe pair of hands’ in this bizarre election, not least thanks to his uncharacteristically sound choice of VP candidate.