Some UIUC Employees are Denied Coverage of Gender Affirming Care
In the state of Illinois, insurance companies are required to cover treatments for gender dysphoria and not to discriminate on the basis of gender identity.
Because of this, insurance companies generally cover top surgery, bottom surgery, and some amount of hormone therapy and counseling. However, these are not the only types of gender affirming care.
The World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) lists the treatments that insurance providers ought to cover when a patient’s doctor deems it medically necessary. This list includes:
- Facial feminization surgery
- Facial masculinization surgery
- Facial hair removal
- Voice training
- Vocal cord surgery
A direct quote from WPATH’s Medical Necessity Statement, referring to the above treatments:
“The medical procedures attendant to gender affirming/confirming surgeries are not ‘cosmetic’ or ‘elective’ or ‘for the mere convenience of the patient.’ These reconstructive procedures are not optional in any meaningful sense, but are understood to be medically necessary for the treatment of the diagnosed condition.”
But most of the insurance companies that service UIUC employees ignore this guidance. They take advantage of a loophole and classify the above treatments as cosmetic- even when an individual’s doctor deems them medically necessary.
For example, Aetna excludes voice training, facial hair removal, and all the surgeries in the bullet points above, deeming them to be cosmetic, no matter what one’s doctor says.
Meanwhile, the University has chosen to do nothing. Despite the University of Illinois’ professed commitment to supporting trans and gender diverse employees, they have chosen to side with the insurance companies and allow their employees to go without medically necessary care.
What Can We Do About It?
For the Non Tenure Faculty Union, this is an issue close to our hearts. A significant portion of specialized faculty at UIUC are trans or gender diverse, and some of us have personally experienced being denied gender affirming care due to this issue.
As specialized faculty, we also are part of the broader campus community, and we see this issue affecting UIUC employees outside of our bargaining unit. (We suspect it may also affect students, but we are not as familiar with UIUC’s student insurance. If you have knowledge about this, we’d love to talk with you!)
We are currently bargaining our third Collective Bargaining Agreement with the University. In our proposal, we propose that the University set up a reimbursement program for expenses of gender affirming care that are not covered by insurance. The negotiations over our contract will take place throughout the Spring semester, and perhaps into the summer.
In our initial bargaining sessions with administration, their team expressed doubts about whether such a program is needed. They expressed a belief that all medically necessary gender affirming care is already covered by insurance. It seems they are unquestioningly following the lead of insurance companies, rather than following WPATH’s standards of medically necessary care.
In our March 29 bargaining session, the admin team indicated that they do not anticipate changing their existing policies on gender affirming care. But we’re not giving up.
If they genuinely believe in providing medically necessary healthcare to their trans and gender diverse faculty, what will they do when the insurance plans they offer fail to do that?
We hope to work with campus organizations and RSO’s to amplify this issue. With broad support from campus community members both inside and outside of our union, we are hopeful that the University will listen!
Get Involved!
Follow us on social media to learn about updates and actions that you can take!
- Follow us on Instagram: @ntfc6546
- Like us on Facebook: NTFC Local 6546
Do you have personal experience or relevant knowledge to share with us on the topic of Gender Affirming Care in the UIUC campus community? Or do you want to plan an event together? Or are you a trans new employee trying to navigate the confusing thicket of insurance options? We’d love to hear from you! Our DM’s are open on social media, or you can email us at ntfc6546@gmail.com.
In Solidarity
Dani Nyikos, NTFC Co-Lead Negotiator
Theresa Dobbs, NTFC Communications Chair
