Surgery cap lifted on transgender ops
Gender-affirming surgeries for transgender people are set to become a lot more accessible, now that a cap on the number of funded operations has been lifted.
Winter Kneale, a 19-year-old transgender woman from Wellington, was cautiously optimistic about the news.
‘‘I never really looked into surgery that hard because I always figured it was something I wouldn’t be able to afford.’’
She said getting a vaginoplasty, which the Ministry of Health estimated would cost between $25,000 and $80,000, would drastically improve her quality of life.
‘‘It would give me a lot more comfort in my day-to-day life. It would mean I can go to the bathroom comfortably, I can enjoy being intimate with a partner.’’
Kneale said it would also mean she didn’t have to ‘‘tuck’’ every day, a practice some transfeminine people do in order to reshape their groin area.
‘‘The alternative to me would be living in discomfort all my life or raising all the money myself and going overseas to get the surgery.’’
It is not yet clear when the policy change would have an impact on surgery waiting times, which were reported to be as long as 50 years.
OutLine manager Duncan Matthews said his organisation worked with a lot of gender diverse and transgender people on their wellbeing and mental health.
‘‘A lot of [the issues] can derive from being unable to access healthcare to live and be who they are.
‘‘Every barrier that is removed gives people more confidence and hope that they will be able to access support to be who they are.’’
Greens co-leader James Shaw, who was covering Associate Health Minister Julie Anne Genter’s portfolio while she was on maternity leave, said predictions on waiting list reductions was not yet possible because of ‘‘a number of interrelated factors’’.
‘‘There is a long way to go to ensure nationally consistent affirming healthcare pathways.’’
Shaw said an interim arrangement of referring patients at the top of the list to a surgeon in the private sector was in place, but there was ‘‘work under way’’ for the provision of gender-affirming surgery.
Genter’s office confirmed the funding only related to genital surgeries such as vaginoplasty, phalloplasty and metoidioplasty. Other gender-affirming surgeries such as mastectomy, hysterectomy and orchidectomy would continue to be the responsibility of district health boards.
Previously the surgeries, funded from the High-Cost Treatment Pool, were limited to three male-to-female surgeries and one female-to-male surgery every two years.