The Trump administration finalized a regulation Friday that overturns Obama-era protections for transgender people against sex discrimination in healthcare. The policy shift, long sought by the president’s religious and socially conservative supporters, defines gender as a person’s biological sex. The Obama administration regulation defined gender as a person’s internal sense of being male, female, neither or a combination. LGBTQ groups say explicit protections are needed for people seeking sex-reassignment treatment, and even for transgender people who need medical care for common conditions such as diabetes or heart problems. Behind the dispute over legal rights is a medically recognized condition called “gender dysphoria” — discomfort or distress caused by a discrepancy between the gender that a person identifies as and the gender at birth.
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