{"id":515042,"date":"2022-03-11T13:35:26","date_gmt":"2022-03-11T18:35:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/newscenter\/?p=515042"},"modified":"2022-11-28T14:01:44","modified_gmt":"2022-11-28T19:01:44","slug":"anti-trans-laws-use-child-protective-services-to-harm-transgender-youth-515042","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/newscenter\/anti-trans-laws-use-child-protective-services-to-harm-transgender-youth-515042\/","title":{"rendered":"Anti-trans laws use child protective services to harm transgender youth"},"content":{"rendered":"

Texas Governor Greg Abbott (R) recently instructed<\/a> his state\u2019s Department of Family and Protective Services (DFPS) to consider gender-affirming medical treatments for transgender youth and children a form of child abuse under state law. The new law now legally requires doctors, nurses, and teachers to report to DFPS parents who help their child in receiving such care.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor trans children and families, their very existence is at stake. Investigations may result in child removal and placement outside the home, as well as denial of essential medical care,\u201d writes\u00a0Mical Raz<\/a>, the University of Rochester<\/a>\u2019s Charles E. and Dale L. Phelps Professor in Public Policy and Health and a professor of history, in a\u00a0Washington Post<\/em>\u00a0op-ed<\/a>\u00a0published in the \u201cMade by History\u201d section.<\/p>\n

\u201cExploiting broad legal statutes to criminalize, punish and break up families of disfavored and disempowered groups has a long history,\u201d argues Raz, who is also a physician at the University\u2019s Strong Memorial Hospital. \u201cSystems of child protection have often been deployed in ways that harm the very ones they have been charged to safeguard.\u201d<\/p>\n

Added requirements to the 1974 Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act include overly vague definitions of child abuse, such as \u201cemotional neglect\u201d or \u201cmental injury.\u201d By the late 1970s, child welfare researchers across the political spectrum cautioned that these definitions should be narrowed. \u201cYet politicians made the opposite choice,\u201d writes Raz.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, public condemnation of the new Texas directive has been swift, including from the American Academy of Pediatrics<\/a>. Already, a leading pediatric hospital, Texas Children\u2019s Hospital in Houston, has paused<\/a>\u00a0providing gender-affirming care to shield employees and patients from possible legal ramifications. \u201cThere are real consequences to these policies,\u201d Raz notes.<\/p>\n

The author of What\u2019s Wrong with the Poor? Psychiatry, Race, and the War on Poverty<\/em> (University of North Carolina Press, 2013) and Abusive Policies: How the American Child Welfare System Lost Its Way<\/em> (University of North Carolina Press, 2020), Raz is an expert on the history of US poverty and child abuse policies over the last half century.<\/p>\n