Mental health groups respond to Trump military transgender ban

VoA / Public domainYesterday, President Donald Trump announced a ban on people who identify as transgender serving in the US military. US mental health professional associations swiftly challenged the ban. The associations cite research supporting the inclusion of transgender men and women. For example, a 2016 RAND Corporation study showed that inclusion of transgender servicemembers would have little to no impact on costs or combat readiness.

The major US mental health associations issued the following statements in regard to the ban.

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How President Trump will impact US mental health care

Future President Trump // Photo credit: Gage Skidmore [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia CommonsDonald Trump was elected President of the United States yesterday in what has been labeled a stunning upset. While much of the broader social discussion today will focus on how Trump’s victory happened, as psychotherapists we now must consider how President Trump will impact our profession.

Mental health is not mentioned in Trump’s health care reform paper or on the health care page of his campaign web site. So for this post, we look to his other stated policy goals to see how mental health care would be impacted.

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