Florida Trans Health Restrictions Unconstitutional, Judge Rules
metroweekly.comban on puberty blockers and hormone therapy for transgender youth.Florida is currently one of 25 states with such restrictions in place.Hinkle’s ruling also blocks Florida officials from enforcing rules approved by the Florida Board of Medicine and Board of Osteopathic Medicine in order to comply with the law.Those rules not only bar youth from accessing gender-affirming treatments, but imposed the first-of-their-kind restrictions to make it more difficult for transgender adults in the state to access gender-affirming care.Among those restrictions were that adult patients could only see a doctor in person before receiving any kind of gender-affirming treatment, including regular prescription renewals.
That limited the number of medical professionals available to transgender adults. Additionally, adults had to sign “informed consent” forms in the presence of their doctors.
Those forms cast gender-affirming care as experimental, based on flawed research, ineffective, and dangerous to their health, potentially requiring signatories to receive lifelong care.
Critics said the forms were not only misleading but were not based in fact. In his ruling, Hinkle found that both the underlying law — which was championed by Republican Gov.