LGBTQ+ org seeks $25M for youth gender-affirming care

(The Center Square) – An LGBTQ+ organization in California is asking the Golden State’s lawmakers to allocate $26 million in general fund revenue to help pay for gender-affirming care for minors. “This is more of a preventative budget ask than anything else,” Danny Ceseña, network director for the California LGBTQ Health and Human Services Network, told The Center Square on Friday. “This budget ask will mainly go into effect only if the federal government, in their CMS-proposed rules, prevent access to gender-affirming care for minors, especially minors that receive their insurance benefits through Medi-Cal.” (CMS stands for the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services.) In December, The Center Square reported that federally-funded health care programs would be kept from paying for gender-affirming care for transgender children. Children who identify as transgender who are on Medicare and those under 19 years old on the federally funded Children’s Health