Lola and Thom had a lovely chat about the state of healthcare and the SOGI communities.

Episode Notes:

Department of Health and Human Services (HHS)

is tasked with ensuring the health and well-being of all Americans
HHS works to ensure that LGBT Americans, families, and communities receive equal access to health services by providing enhanced resources for LGBT health issues
They developing better information regarding LGBT health needs; and working to close the LGBT health disparities gap that currently exists.

April 24^th, 2020
HRC responded to Trump administration’s latest actions to undermine the rights and welfare of the SOGI community.
Siting Politico:
- the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is one step closer to finalizing a major change to the federal regulation implementing the civil rights provision, Section 1557, of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) to remove explicit protections for LGBTQ people in health care programs and activities by excluding protections from discrimination based on sex stereotyping and gender identity.
HRC President Alphonso David responded:
- “…efforts to remove existing non-discrimination protections for the LGBTQ community is unacceptable, blatantly offensive, and cruel…”
- “…We will fight this policy & fight to get a pro-equality President into office this November who represents all of us.”
According to HRC Foundation’s analysis of the 2018 BRFSS,
- 17% of LGBTQ adults do not have any kind of health insurance coverage, compared to 12% of non-LGBTQ adults.
- Furthermore,
  - 23% of LGBTQ adults of color,
  - 22% of transgender adults
  - 32% of transgender adults of color have no form of health coverage.
- This can lead to avoidance of medical care even when medically necessary and to severe economic hardship when medical care is ultimately accessed

Vice President Mike Pence and Office for Civil Rights Director Roger Severino.
- Have reallocated significant resources away from civil rights and patient privacy in order to expand religious exemptions,
- enacted rules that severely restrict access to reproductive health care, and undermine strong nondiscrimination protections under the Affordable Care Act.
On Friday, November 1, 2019—the first day of National Adoption Month
- the HHS announced that it would not enforce strong and comprehensive regulations requiring its grantees to ensure that federal taxpayer dollars are not used to fund discrimination and that it would seek to replace these regulations with weak and ambiguous ones.

Represents more than 3 million members and supporters nationwide.
It is the largest national LGBTQ civil rights organization
Their mission is to ensure basic equal rights for all LGBTQ people at home, at work, and in the greater community.