Texas Tribune / Azul Sordo
Texas Legal professional Basic Ken Paxton speaks on the Collin County Labor day picnic in Plano on Sept. 2, 2023. His workplace is looking for info on transgender sufferers from at the least two out-of-state well being care facilities.
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Texas Legal professional Basic Ken Paxton is requesting medical data of Texas youth who’ve acquired gender-affirming care from a Georgia telehealth clinic, marking at the least the second time he’s sought such data from suppliers in one other state.
The clinic, QueerMed, confirmed on Friday morning that they acquired the request. QueerMed mentioned it stopped servicing youth in Texas after the state banned transition-related care final yr. The clinic’s founder mentioned the legal professional common requested details about sufferers relationship again to Jan. 1, 2022, earlier than the ban took impact.
The clinic mentioned that Paxton requested for personal details about Texas residents who have been supplied with telehealth care in Texas earlier than the ban, and residents supplied with care outdoors of Texas after the ban. The request, they mentioned, practically mirrors one the legal professional common despatched to Seattle Kids’s Hospital final yr.
Paxton requested Seattle Kids’s for a wide range of affected person info, together with the variety of Texas youngsters they’ve handled, drugs prescribed to youngsters, the kids’s diagnoses and the title of Texas laboratories the place assessments for youth are administered.
In response to that request, often known as a civil investigative demand, Seattle Kids’s sued the Texas Workplace of the Legal professional Basic in December.
QueerMed confirmed that Paxton despatched his request to them on Nov. 17, the identical day that Seattle Kids’s acquired the same demand for paperwork. QueerMed acquired the request Dec. 7, resulting from mail delays. Its receipt of the letter was first reported by The Houston Chronicle on Friday morning.
The Workplace of the Legal professional Basic didn’t reply to requests for touch upon the QueerMed inquiry, and has not publicly mentioned his request to Seattle Kids’s.
Paxton’s requests come amidst an intensified Republican-led effort in Texas to dam the state’s transgender youth from accessing transition-related care like puberty blockers and hormone remedy. Final yr, the state banned medical doctors from prescribing such remedies to minors, although main medical teams argue gender-affirming care is lifesaving for transgender youth who face increased charges of suicide makes an attempt and psychological well being issues than their cisgender friends.
The legislation, Senate Invoice 14, additionally made it unlawful to carry out surgical procedures on minors. Earlier than the legislation handed, Texas Pediatric Society president Louis Appel mentioned he was not conscious of minors in Texas having backside surgical procedure, an umbrella time period for surgical procedure that includes genitals.
Karen Loewy, a lawyer with Lambda Authorized representing organizations and Texas households of transgender youth making an attempt to dam SB 14 in courtroom, mentioned there’s “zero authorization” within the legislation for Paxton’s requests to clinics outdoors of Texas.
“It’s exhausting to not see this as half and parcel of the AG’s scorched-earth method to persecuting trans youngsters and their dad and mom who’re being pressured to undertake journey outdoors of Texas to get their youngsters the medically obligatory care they want,” Loewy mentioned.
Texas is considered one of 19 states with legal guidelines proscribing minors’ entry to gender-affirming care handed lately. Republican lawmakers have additionally sought to limit transgender youth from utilizing sure public restrooms or enjoying on sports activities groups that don’t align with their organic gender.
Loewy mentioned that “a handful” of different organizations have acquired requests for medical data from Paxton. She declined to supply the precise quantity or names of organizations the legal professional common has contacted.
A QueerMed official couldn’t instantly touch upon how the clinic will reply to the legal professional common.
This text initially appeared within the Texas Tribune.
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