A federal appeals court has upheld Oklahoma’s law prohibiting gender-affirming medical treatments for minors. According to Fox News, the State Senate passed Senate Bill 613, which makes it a felony for medical professionals to provide gender-affirming care, such as puberty blockers and hormones, to individuals under the age of 18.
The bill was passed by the state’s Republican-controlled legislature and signed into law by Governor Kevin Stitt in 2023. Five families with transgender children and a doctor challenged the state law, arguing it violates their constitutional rights.
The plaintiffs, represented by Lambda Legal, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), and the ACLU of Oklahoma, argued that lawmakers passed the law with discriminatory intent, pointing to a 2022 law that froze pandemic relief funding for the OU Health hospital system unless Oklahoma Children’s Hospital stopped providing gender-affirming care to minors.
A federal judge declined to block the law from taking effect in 2023, writing that gender-affirming medical care for children is “an area where medical and policy debate is ongoing” and the state “may reasonably side with caution before allowing irreversible medical treatments for its children.”
The U.S. Supreme Court in June allowed Tennessee’s similar ban on gender-affirming care to remain in effect, a ruling that was relied upon when the 10th Circuit issued its ruling in Oklahoma on Wednesday, when a three-judge panel unanimously voted to uphold the ban.
