Excluding Sex-Change Surgery from Policy Discriminates, Georgia Federal Court Finds

A Georgia county and sheriff’s office discriminated when it denied health insurance for a deputy seeking gender reassignment surgery, a federal court decided.

U.S. District Judge Marc Treadwell last week found that Houston County’s health insurance policy, which excluded transgender surgery, “is facially discriminatory and thus violates Title VII” of the U.S. Civil Rights Act. Deputy Anna Lange’s equal protection violation case will now proceed to trial.

The judge also found that Lange’s claim that the county violated the Americans with Disabilities Act failed because she did not show that her gender dysphoria was the result of a physical impairment.

The ruling, if upheld on appeal, could reinforce previous court rulings that employers must include gender-affirming surgery in their health coverage, and cannot deny requests for the medical procedures. The judge in the Lange case pointed out that the exclusion was discriminatory because Houston County’s health care plan, provided through Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield, would provide breast cancer surgery and hormone therapy for menopause, but it would not provide the same procedures as treatment for gender dysphoria.

“The undisputed, ultimate point is that the exclusion applies only to transgender members, and it applies to Lange because she is transgender,” Treadwell wrote. He cited a landmark 2020 U.S. Supreme Court decision that found that Title VII’s protections include gender identity and sexual orientation discrimination.

The sex-change exclusions had been in the county’s health policy since 1998, but had not been challenged until recently. The insurance plan has 66 other medical exclusions and 29 pharmacy benefit exclusions, the court noted.

Although the sheriff, Cullen Talton, initially thought Lange was joking when she told him in 2018 that she was transgender and wanted to wear a female deputy uniform, the sheriff later agreed to the request.

Lange, who was represented in part by the Transgender Legal Defense and Education Fund, said in a statement that it’s “a huge relief to know that I can finally receive the medically necessary care that I was repeatedly and unfairly denied,” according to news reports.

“This decision is not only a personal victory, but a tremendous step forward for all transgender Southerners who are seeking insurance coverage for medically necessary care,” she added.

The decision comes amid increasing backlash by some states’ leaders on transgender issues.

Topics Georgia