CMS ends federal Medicaid, CHIP funding for ‘sex-rejecting’ procedures on children
Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said the interventions “carry serious risks and can cause irreversible harm” to children and vowed that the federal government would no longer use Medicaid and CHIP dollars “to fund procedures that fail to meet the evidentiary standard our children deserve.”
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) announced that federal Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) funds will no longer pay for puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, or “transgender” surgeries performed on children, according to an Aug. 11 Fox News report.
CMS Administrator Dr. Mehmet Oz told Fox that the rule aligns with the Trump administration’s commitment to “protect children from experimental and life-altering sex-rejecting procedures that carry serious long-term health risks and lack sufficiently reliable evidence of clinical benefit.”
“Children deserve our protection, not experimental interventions that pose serious risks and convey no proven benefits,” Oz said. “By cutting off federal funds for these sex-rejecting procedures, we’re following the science, saving taxpayer dollars, and, most importantly, protecting children from potentially irreversible harm so they can truly flourish.”
Medicaid and CHIP will continue covering mental health treatments for children experiencing gender dysphoria and other conditions, Fox reported.
CMS and its parent agency, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), cited potential irreversible harms associated with the procedures, including infertility, impaired sexual function, reduced bone density, and altered brain development.
The move follows an HHS review of national and international studies that identified significant gaps in the evidence supporting the interventions and documented serious safety concerns. According to Fox, CMS pointed specifically to the United Kingdom’s 2024 independent Cass Review, which concluded that medical interventions intended to “change” a child’s sex had developed much faster than the evidence regarding their safety.
HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. first outlined the policy direction in December 2025, when HHS proposed ending federal Medicaid and CHIP funding for the procedures, as Zeale News previously reported.
In a statement cited by Fox Aug. 11, Kennedy declared, “Today, we are ending federal taxpayer funding for sex-rejecting procedures on children.”
“These interventions carry serious risks and can cause irreversible harm,” he added. “The federal government will no longer use Medicaid and CHIP dollars to fund procedures that fail to meet the evidentiary standard our children deserve.”
