BOISE, Idaho (CBS2) — This week, a group of Idaho students launched a fund designed to help Idaho youth access gender-affirming medical care.
In six months' time, it'll be illegal for doctors in Idaho to continue providing gender-affirming medical care to trans minors. Jan. 1, 2024, is when House Bill 71 goes into effect.
So a group of young people is raising funds to help trans and non-binary youth travel out of state to continue accessing medical care. It's called the Eve Devitt Fund - named after a young trans woman who has been pushing against legislation like H71 since 2020.
When Phoenix McCoubrey learned Governor Little had signed H71, he says he wasn't surprised but he was still upset. He began calling his friends who are trans minors right away.
“It was heartbreaking hearing them break down over the phone and not be able to be with them and help them process because there were so many people I had to talk to and let know that this was going on and start making plans for things like the Devitt Fund," McCoubrey said.
Come Jan. 1, minors experiencing gender dysphoria and currently accessing gender-affirming medical care, including hormone therapy and puberty blockers, will no longer be able to access that care in Idaho. The bill also bans sex change surgery for minors. A doctor performing any such care for people under 18 could face up to ten years behind bars.
The bill’s sponsor, Rep. Bruce Skaug, R-Nampa, said it's a way to protect children "from sterilization and removal of sex organs, healthy sex organs... If the law does not allow a child to get a tattoo, smoke cigarettes, drink alcohol... why would we allow them, in this tender state of mind that is under 18, to make decisions on having their body parts, healthy bodily organs removed?"
The children, their families, and doctors who this legislation will ultimately affect don't see the legislation as a way to protect minors.
It was not until two years after Phoenix had come out, his family had been meeting with his doctor and he'd been seeing a counselor, that he decided with his family to begin taking hormones.
"Ultimately it wasn't my decision. It was my parents who were making a healthcare decision for me, like Idaho parents should be allowed to do, " McCoubrey said. "If you talk to my parents, they talk about how there was an immediate difference, that as soon as I started experiencing changes, that I kind of grew into myself and became my own person."
He met with state lawmakers, along with his parents and his doctor as this bill was making its way through the statehouse to discuss what his experience was like before and after he started receiving gender-affirming healthcare.
Since Phoenix is now 18, he won’t have to travel out of state to continue accessing medical care, but if he were just a year younger and had to stop taking hormones, he said, "I would not be graduating from high school and going to college, I would not be doing activism like this. I cannot confidently say that I'd be alive."
After the summer, he'll be pursuing a degree in music education.
He worries about what this legislation will mean for his peers.
“We've talked a lot about suicide rates and stuff like that, but we're also going to see drops in grades, drops in attendance. Mental health is going to be bad, very, very bad, and I think we'll also see a lot of issues with students not feeling supported within their community and that coming out in behavioral issues, things like that,"McCoubrey said.
That's part of why a group of young Idahoans say they started the Eve Devitt fund - part scholarship to recognize young advocates and part mutual aid to help cover expenses for youth who may soon travel across state lines to continue receiving medical treatment.
"We'll help them pay for that with parental consent and information on doctors and things like that, where they can start that process,"McCoubrey said. "And discussing with their parents, with doctors, and getting that healthcare as much as they can in this situation."
In April, the ACLU announced it planned to challenge the legislation in court.
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