Department Of Defense Orders Halt To Gender Transition Medicine, Procedures

Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times,

The U.S. Department of Defense said in a new memorandum that it is halting medical treatments and procedures for troops who identify as transgender and other personnel with gender dysphoria (GD).

“Within the direct care component, meaning at military medical treatment facilities … Service members and all other covered beneficiaries 19 years of age or older may only receive mental health care and counseling for GD,” Dr. Stephen L. Ferrara, acting assistant secretary of defense for health affairs, said in the memo, which is dated May 9.

“Apart from consults for the diagnosis of GD and provision of mental health care and counseling … staff will refer all other care (e.g., cross-sex hormone therapy) for GD to the private sector.”

The Pentagon did not return a request for comment by publication time.

GD refers to when a person believes they’re a gender that’s different from their sex.

President Donald Trump, after taking office in January, said in an order that “expressing a false ‘gender identity’ divergent from an individual’s sex cannot satisfy the rigorous standards necessary for military service.”

Defense officials later said that all troops with a history of GD would be discharged, with limited exceptions. That process was paused after court rulings against the policy. The Supreme Court on May 6 stayed those rulings, enabling officials to resume the process.

Officials said on May 8 that they were discharging about 1,000 troops who identify as transgender or otherwise have GD.

Ferrara said in the new memo, which was sent to the director of the Defense Health Agency and assistant secretaries at the Army, Navy, and Air Force, that he was providing fresh guidance in light of the Supreme Court ruling.

That includes emphasizing that military doctors are not to perform any surgeries that would aid in gender transition, such as breast removal.

Ferrara also said that all unscheduled, scheduled, and planned surgical procedures “associated with facilitating sex reassignment for Service members diagnosed with GD” are now canceled, as are any previously approved waivers for the surgeries. 

Ferrara said his office would accept waiver requests for care deemed medically necessary to address surgical complications.

The military is allowing troops with GD who have been receiving cross-sex hormones to keep receiving them until they are separated, if a health care provider recommends that path “in order to prevent further complications.”

The Department of Defense, though, will no longer pay for newly initiated cross-sex hormones, according to the memo, as ordered by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.