The nation’s leading physicians’ organization walked back its recent statements questioning the safety of gender transition surgeries for teenagers, intensifying the sharp policy debate over treatments for transgender-identifying minors.
The American Medical Association, which advises more than 270,000 doctors on best practices, backpedaled Thursday in its monthly newsletter on its February statement questioning the scientific evidence to support gender-related surgeries for teenagers struggling with gender dysphoria.
The AMA has been praised by the Trump administration and Republicans in Congress, such as Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-LA), for reportedly repudiating surgical interventions, including mastectomies, facial surgeries, and genital reconstructions, for teenagers who identify as the opposite sex.
But Dr. David Aizuss, the AMA board chairman, wrote in the monthly newsletter that the organization’s position has been misrepresented by the media, saying that his organization “supports gender-affirming care as medically necessary per our policy.”
The controversy began during a January event for medical societies and experts hosted by Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator Mehmet Oz to discuss appropriate standards of care for minors with gender dysphoria.
During the January meeting, the American Society of Plastic Surgeons was the only professional organization to repudiate surgical interventions for teenagers under 19, the New York Times reported. The ASPS officially came out against surgical interventions for gender dysphoric minors in early February.
Shortly after the ASPS issued its official statement, the AMA told National Review that the organization “respects the expertise and dedication of surgeons who care for patients every day” and “supports evidence-based treatment, including gender-affirming care.”
The AMA’s stance, as reported by the outlet in February, was that, “in the absence of clear evidence, the AMA agrees with ASPS that surgical interventions in minors should be generally deferred to adulthood.”
But on Thursday, Aizuss’s monthly newsletter said of the message, “That phrasing did not come from the AMA,” and, “How reporters frame their stories is beyond our control.”
Aizuss wrote that, following the release of the ASPS position statement, the AMA executive committee met and “agreed on language to be used only if the AMA was contacted by the media, and for the AMA president to use in interviews.” He added that the board was “clear that we were not changing AMA policy.”
The Washington Examiner contacted the AMA with requests for comment before publication.
Gender transition surgeries for minors are much rarer than hormonal treatments, including puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones.
A 2023 paper published in the Journal of the American Medical Association found there were fewer than 3,700 gender-related surgical procedures on patients ages 12 to 18 from 2016 to 2020, accounting for less than 8% of the more than 48,000 procedures in the survey.
The majority of the surgeries performed on minors were mastectomies of healthy breast tissue for transgender-identifying girls.
The Trump administration has made it a top priority for the CMS to curtail gender transition medicine for minors, which it characterizes as “sex-rejecting,” as opposed to “gender-affirming.”
On the first day of his second term, President Donald Trump signed an executive order basing the definitions of man and woman on biological sex. Within a week, he signed an additional executive order directing his agencies to find ways to curtail transgender procedures for children.
The Department of Health and Human Services and the CMS followed through on that executive order in December 2025 by issuing guidance to prohibit Medicare funding for all hospitals and healthcare systems that provide minors transgender medical services, including surgeries and hormone therapies.
The rule effectively established a nationwide ban, as nearly all healthcare providers accept Medicare, but a Biden-appointed judge in Oregon last week overturned HHS’s funding ban.
Several HHS officials, including Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., praised the ASPA in early February for denouncing gender surgeries for minors.
“We commend the American Society of Plastic Surgeons for standing up to the overmedicalization lobby and defending sound science,” Kennedy said at the time. “By taking this stand, they are helping protect future generations of American children from irreversible harm.”
HHS did not issue a similar press release praising the AMA following its statement to the National Review.
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Terry Schilling, head of American Principles Project, which advocates against gender transitions for minors, told the Washington Examiner that the AMA’s position contradicts evidence-based medicine.
“The American Medical Association’s reckless endorsement of child sex changes represents a profound betrayal of its duty to ‘do no harm,’ sacrificing vulnerable minors to the radical trans ideology at the expense of their physical and mental health,” Schilling said.
