A Shield for the Innocent: HHS Takes Historic Action to Protect America’s Children
On Thursday, December 18, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) took historic action to protect America’s children from experimental and irreversible medical procedures. HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. signed a formal Declaration that redefines so-called “gender-affirming care” for what it truly is: malpractice rather than medicine.
The document states explicitly what medical science confirms: “Sex-rejecting procedures for children and adolescents are neither safe nor effective… and therefore, fail to meet professionally recognized standards of health care.”
Ending the Financial Pipeline
This finding triggers a powerful consequence found in Section V of the document. The Declaration cites federal law 42 U.S.C. § 1320a-7(b)(6)(B), establishing that the government may “exclude individuals or entities from participation in any Federal health care program” if they provide services that fail to meet these standards.
The implications are immediate and far-reaching. This means that hospitals continuing to perform these surgeries face a catastrophic loss of funding. As CMS Administrator Dr. Mehmet Oz explained during the press conference announcing this declaration, any hospital that violates this standard “will no longer be able to participate in the Medicare and Medicaid program” and is “going to pay a very steep price.”
This Declaration shuts down the financial engine driving this harmful industry, which has prioritized profit over patient care. Secretary Kennedy addressed the profit motive in his remarks:
“Unnecessary medical interventions drive big money interests that push sex rejecting treatments. Today’s revenue for sex rejecting drugs and surgeries in 2023 were estimated in one study to exceed $4.4 billion and on track to exceed 7.8 billion by 2030.”
“One doctor was recorded callously describing sex rejecting procedures as a big money maker. Hospitals rake in millions of dollars by convincing boys that a lifetime of off-label prescriptions for estrogen and testosterone blockers… are the only way to achieve true happiness and belonging in life. It’s wrong.”
Dr. Oz laid bare the financial exploitation:
“According to a 2022 JAMA data, so it’s very recent. The typical vaginoplasty, a procedure a child does not need, cost $60,000. Shockingly, a phaloplasty, the creation of a penis, costs on average in America, according to this data, high quality, $150,000 per child.”
Protecting Children From Permanent Harm
More importantly, it provides a critical barrier against physical and spiritual harm.
Chloe Cole, a courageous young woman who detransitioned, spoke of the spiritual deception that lured her into this destructive path:
“For me, it started with being lied to about who I was by adults outside of my family. I was made to feel that the way that God dutifully made me was, in fact, a mistake. A mistake that could only be fixed by so-called modern medicine.”
The medical industry affirmed a lie rather than helping her heal. The result was permanent physical loss:
“My doctors, rather than guiding me, they affirmed my childish misgivings about my developing body… at 13 years old, I was administered puberty blockers and testosterone in high doses. And when I was only 15, they removed my breasts.”
“My questions about whether I will be able to have children or about the future of my reproductive health and my overall health have gone unanswered. But that mastectomy ensured that I am never going to be able to nourish whatever children I may have. And this happened before I was even mature enough to understand that one day I would aspire to become a mother.”
Affirming Truth, Shielding God’s Creation
The HHS Declaration is more than policy—it is a victory for biological reality and a shield for the innocent. By cutting off the financial pipeline that fuels this exploitation, the federal government takes a stand: the United States will no longer validate the lie that a child is born in the wrong body. It protects the souls of our children — by refusing to fund the mutilation of the body, we affirm the perfection of the Creator’s design.
This Declaration affirms a foundational truth: God is infallible. God does not make mistakes.
We stand firm in this truth. Chloe Cole points the way forward, reminding us that true healing is found by embracing the beauty of God’s creation:
“This God—his way is perfect;
the word of the Lord proves true;
he is a shield for all those who take refuge in him.”
Psalm 18:30 (ESV)
ICYMI
- Check out Goldwater Institute’s Myths and Facts on ESAs
- Read the letter sent to parents in a Chandler primary school informing them that one of their male teachers was “transitioning” to a female
- See what Erika Kirk had to say about the upcoming year at Amfest 2025
- Read how the process of deleting DEI language has begun from the English curriculum