https:::://www.......hhs........gov/

 

Another looming pandemic?! Better make sure you're vaccinated before it's...

...too late.

Quips and Quotations (Tried and Trudeau Edition)

 

Trump has suggested that Canada become the 51st state in our union. Does that mean that we can adopt the Canadian health care system and guarantee health care to all, lower the cost of prescription drugs, and spend 50% less per capita on health care? I'm all for it.

--Bernie Sanders

Corrections and Retractions (Supermajority Supermeddling Edition)

 

The Ohio House of Representatives has overridden Mike DeWine's veto of Bill 68, banning gender-affirming care, including puberty blockers prescribed by a doctor, for those under the age of 18. In addition, the bill bans medical professionals from even diagnosing gender dysphoria in minors, and, going outside the realm of medicine, prohibits transgender females in K-12 and college from participating in girls' and women's sports. The Ohio Senate (currently on vacation) still has to sign off on it, but expectations are that it will.

It's a setback for the LGBTQ community and its allies, but we've been set back before. And before. And before. 

The good fight continues.

Quips and Quotations (Buckeye State Checks and Balances Edition)

This bill [a ban on transgender health care for minors] would impact a very small number of Ohio's children. But for those children who face gender dysphoria, the consequences of this bill could not be more profound. Ultimately I believe this is about protecting human life...Many parents have told me that their child would not have survived, would be dead today, if they had not received the treatment they received from one of Ohio's children's hospitals...These are gut-wrenching decisions that should be made by parents and should be informed by teams of doctors who are advising them. Were I to sign House Bill 68, or were House Bill 68 to become law, Ohio would be saying that the state, that the government, knows better what is medically best for a child than the two people who love that child the most: the parents.

--Mike DeWine, Republican Governor of Ohio

(I fully expected DeWine to sign this bill into law, but people sometimes surprise you. Go, Mike! Not that this is the final word on the subject. HB 68 passed the state's House and Senate by a supermajority, and that same supermajority could override the governor's veto. And even if that doesn't happen, DeWine has said he wants some kind of prohibition or restriction, just not what landed on his desk. Nevertheless, it's a ray of hope at the end of a very harrowing year for the LGBTQ community, both inside and outside of Ohio--Kirk)