Teens Speak Out After Gender Surgery Pause; Sepsis Rate Jumps Following Abortion Ban

Welcome to the latest edition of Investigative Roundup, highlighting some of the best investigative reporting on healthcare each week.

Teens Speak Out After Hospital Pauses Transgender Surgeries

In the wake of President Donald Trump’s executive order aimed at restricting access to gender-affirming care for individuals younger than 19, affected teenagers and their parents are speaking out about one hospitals’ pause on transgender surgeries, WBEZ Chicago reported.

In the 2 weeks since Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital paused surgeries for transgender youth, WBEZ spoke with 10 patients or their parents about the impact.

“They described their disappointment, their loss of hope for one day having a procedure, and their anger that this is coming now, after they already feel threatened and marginalized by hateful rhetoric around the country,” the article stated.

For one 17-year-old transgender boy who lives in the Chicago suburbs, surgery to remove breast tissue was the “next logical step,” the article stated. But now, the procedure can’t be scheduled.

“Getting this treatment isn’t fixing something that’s wrong with me,” the teen, who asked for anonymity to protect his privacy and safety, told the outlet. “It’s just helping me grow more into who I want to be and who I can feel most comfortable existing as.”

The mother of a 15-year-old transgender girl told WBEZ: “If we can’t get estrogen in a year, what do we do? Parents with means are talking about leaving the country.”

Robert Garofalo, MD, MPH, founding director of the gender development program at Lurie Children’s, told WBEZ that he understands the frustration. “As someone who has spent his entire career at Lurie Children’s, I can assure you these kids and these families matter to this institution. It’s important to know that this decision was painstakingly difficult, and it was made amid unprecedented circumstances and external pressures.”

He further said Lurie Children’s believes the decision protects the majority of services in the program.

Sepsis Rate Soared Following Texas Abortion Ban

In Texas, pregnancy became “far more dangerous” following the state’s 2021 abortion ban, ProPublica reported, citing its own data analysis.

The rate of sepsis soared more than 50% for women hospitalized when they lost pregnancies in the second trimester, the outlet found.

“This is exactly what we predicted would happen and exactly what we were afraid would happen,” Lorie Harper, MD, MSCI, a maternal-fetal medicine specialist in Austin, told ProPublica.

Harper, along with a dozen other maternal health experts, told ProPublica its findings add to evidence the abortion ban in Texas is precipitating dangerous delays in care.

State law threatens up to 99 years in prison for providing an abortion, ProPublica noted. And though the ban includes an exception for a “medical emergency,” the definition of what this includes has led to confusion and debate.

ProPublica reported that its analysis comes as Texas legislators consider amending the state’s abortion ban after previous reporting from the outlet, and as doctors, federal lawmakers, and the state’s largest newspaper have urged state officials to review pregnancy-related deaths following the ban.

Gov. Greg Abbott’s office said in a statement provided to ProPublica that state law is clear and pointed to health department data showing 135 abortions since Roe was overturned without prosecution. The majority were categorized as responses to an emergency, but did not specify what kind, ProPublica reported. Five were solely to “preserve [the] health of [the] woman.”

Federal Funding Cuts Threaten Decades of Research

Within a month of taking office, President Donald Trump’s cost cutting program is threatening to “reshape the infrastructure that has made the U.S. the envy of the world in medical innovation,” NBC News reported.

This has included a freeze on federal grants, layoffs across federal agencies, diminished funding for biomedical research, and executive orders aimed at dismantling programs focused on gender and diversity, the article stated.

Ultimately, these actions have left some scientists “in fear they may have to slow or abandon research projects, potentially walking back years of progress and preventing new scientific breakthroughs,” NBC News reported.

Meanwhile, many researchers, doctors, and university leaders are “organizing for a showdown,” both through the court system and public opinion, in order to “save institutions, money, and workers who have propelled research for decades,” the article stated.

“There’s a battle ahead to protect not just the funding, but the social contract that the federal government and institutions have had to enable the scientific research enterprise in America in the last 80 years,” Holden Thorp, PhD, the editor-in-chief of the Science family of scientific journals, told NBC News.

White House spokesperson Kush Desai told NBC News in an emailed statement that the Trump administration was focused on better using taxpayer dollars when it comes to research.

“The Trump administration is committed to slashing waste, fraud, and abuse while increasing transparency of where limited taxpayer dollars from NIH are going and how exactly they’re advancing scientific research and development,” Desai told the outlet. “Contrary to the hysteria, redirecting billions of allocated NIH spending away from opaque administrative expenses means there will be more money and resources available for legitimate scientific research, not less.”

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