The about-to-end administration of US president Joe Biden is said to be bolstering health care protections against discrimination LGBTQIA people.
Particularly, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) strengthened the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) rule prohibiting discrimination on the basis of sex, sexual orientation and gender identity in certain health programs and activities.
This rule involves Section 1557 of the ACA, which prohibit discrimination on the basis of race, color, national origin, sex, age and disability in some of the health programs and activities.
Under former US president Donald Trump, the policy was to provide protections against discrimination based on race, color, national origin, sex, age or disability. However, the definition of sex was narrowed to only mean “biological sex,” which eliminated transgender people from among those who should receive protections.
It is worth noting that the supposed positive mood isn’t a complete success, with the Biden administration still allowing “religious freedom and conscience” to still apply. Meaning, health providers are still allowed to discriminate (and this won’t be called discriminatory) if they decline to provide any care if it conflicts with a “sincerely-held belief.”
