According to Campus Reform, the University of Rochester and John Hopkins University are two such institutions keeping their coverage for chemical sex changes in their new student health insurance plans.
At Rochester, premiums under its new plan are rising by roughly 13%, even as school officials confirm coverage for gender-affirming and reproductive endocrinology services will continue.
The former plan, known as the SHIP (Student Health Insurance Plan) program, ended on July 31 and was immediately replaced with the Aetna Student Health plan on August 1.
Meanwhile, Johns Hopkins automatically enrolls full-time students into its annual $3,600 health plan — which covers trans hormones and surgeries — unless students successfully file a waiver. The university has covered transgender procedures since 2016 and expanded their options in 2022.
Zachary Marschall, editor-in-chief of Campus Reform, argues that bundling these elective procedures into mandatory student plans creates an unfair financial burden.
“It's a problem that students who depend on these insurance plans to have coverage are being forced to pay for the lifestyle choices of a fringe minority of students. It is an elective and a choice to have surgeries that make you think you're changing your gender, but it is not something that everyone should be forced to pay for,” Marschall says.
He also points to financial incentives within university medical systems and healthcare administration as a key driver behind the continued expansion of these benefits.
“I think like most Americans. I hate healthcare administration and the racket of the entire industry. They drive up costs, they hide the real costs from real Americans, and they push things that make them money. And I think these surgeries are lucrative for the healthcare providers, and I think that's an incentive for them to offer it,” Marschall says.
Campus Reform informs that the universities has not responded to prompting for comments regarding their plans.
