A former police lieutenant has filed a lawsuit against the city of Los Angeles after he was allegedly fired for being gay and HIV positive after almost 25 years service.
Steven Prendergast was hired to the force in 1995 and was promoted regularly throughout his employment. He acted as the police department’s spokesman before he was fired in 2019.
The lawsuit claims his firing was a result of discrimination, as he was falsely accused of inappropriately touching two fellow officers during a trip to Washington DC for National Police Week.
Prendergast denies the allegations against him and points out that heterosexual officers who admitted to acts of battery against fellow officers were not terminated for their actions.
He also says he was regularly subjected to homophobic comments from some colleagues, and was denied access to the medical care of his choice because of his HIV diagnosis.
Gay lieutenant forced to endure ‘farcical’ investigation.
The court documents filed on Friday claim sexual orientation discrimination, disability discrimination, medical discrimination and failure to prevent discrimination.
“Because Lt. Prendergast is homosexual and has been diagnosed with HIV, the City wrongfully terminated his employment,” reads the complaint, which has been seen by the Daily Breeze.
It adds that a subsequent internal investigation conducted by police chief Michael Saffell “was a farce that was intended solely to give the City the pretextual reason to terminate Lt. Prendergast”.
The city and police department has not yet been served with the lawsuit and said it was not their practice to comment at this stage.
“The City does however strictly enforce its equal employment guidelines, including prohibitions on workplace harassment, against and for the protection of all ranks of its employees, from entry level positions to top level managers,” a spokesperson said in a statement.
“The City will respond in court at the appropriate time.”
Prendergast is seeking unspecified damages, saying that the city’s failure to prevent discrimination has negatively impacted him physically and emotionally.
A lesbian couple in South Carolina are bringing a historic court fight against the policy that allowed a state-funded agency to bar same-sex couples from fostering children.
Eden Rogers and Brandy Welch were turned away by a government-funded adoption agency because they, as a lesbian couple, did not meet its criteria – to not be a same-sex couple.
Miracle Hill Ministries, which is South Carolina’s largest state-contracted foster care agency, used religious criteria to bar Rogers and Welch from fostering with them in April 2019.
The couple, who already have two daughters, were backed by ACLU and Lambda Legal in bringing a legal challenge against the policy barring same-sex couples from fostering – but Miracle Hill Ministries and the state of South Carolina applied to have the case thrown out.
“We are very excited to hear our case is going forward in court,” Rogers and Welch said in a statement.
“There are many children in South Carolina that need foster homes, and we remain hopeful that couples like us can provide children a lovely home without being rejected or discriminated against.”
Miracle Hill Ministries was able to reject the lesbian couple’s foster application because the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services granted South Carolina’s request for a waiver of nondiscrimination rules for federally funded agencies.
By doing this, the Department of health enabled discrimination against LGBT+ families trying to foster children.
“The federal government told the over 400,000 children in our nation’s foster care system that the religious beliefs of the agencies caring for them come before their needs,” said Leslia Cooper, deputy director of ACLU’s LGBT and HIV project, in a statement.
“Today a federal court pushed back, saying that allowing taxpayer-funded agencies to turn away qualified families because of an agency’s religious criteria violates the Constitution,” she added.
Families who want to foster through Miracle Hill Ministries must sign its “doctrinal statement”, including “that God’s design for marriage is the legal joining of one man and one woman in a life-long covenant relationship” – a requirement that excludes same-sex couples of any faith.
The Department of Health and South Carolina have sanctioned and facilitated the use of these religious criteria in the public child-welfare system.
“The thousands of children in South Carolina’s foster care system are the ones who suffer most when agencies like Miracle Hill use religion as a license to discriminate against people who can provide a loving, nurturing home,” saidSusan Dunn, legal director for the ACLU of South Carolina.
“By allowing this practice to continue, the state of South Carolina and U.S. Department of Health and Human Services have failed the vulnerable children they are supposed to be helping.
“We are excited this case is moving ahead and look forward to continuing the fight against government using religion to deprive children of loving homes.”
For the first time, the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention is including data on transgender people in its reports on HIV infections — and the results show a gradual increase in new cases of the disease over the past several years.
Compared to previous reports that placed transgender people in the same category as “male” and “female,” the latest iteration of total diagnoses of HIV Infection in the United States made public Thursday contains an entire section devoted to transgender people.
The inclusion of the transgender data is part of the CDC’s first-ever inclusion of national-level data by gender in the report. Additionally, CDC has for the first time released estimates of HIV incidence for Puerto Rico and at the county level for high-incidence jurisdictions as the Trump administration’s plan to focus on these areas to beat the HIV epidemic by 2030.
But the news for transgender people isn’t good. According to Diagnoses of HIV Infection in the United States and Dependent Areas, the number of diagnoses of HIV infection for transgender adults and adolescents increased.
Overall, the number of reported new infections increased from 553 in 2014, 589 in 2015, 638 in 2016, 584 in 2017 to 601 in 2018. The diagnoses accounted for about 2 percent of new HIV infections in the United States, according to CDC.
In terms of race and ethnicity, the number of diagnoses of HIV infection for Hispanic/Latino transgender adults and adolescents increased, while the number of diagnoses of HIV infection for black/African American, white and multi-racial transgender adults remained stable. It should be noted the numbers of HIV infection among black and Latino transgender people are higher than other groups.
Overwhelmingly, new HIV infections are higher for transgender women than for transgender men across multiple races. The largest percentage of new infections for transgender women as opposed to transgender men was persons of multiple races at 96 percent, followed by Hispanics/Latinos at 94 percent and blacks/African-Americans at 93 percent. For the white demographics, transgender women made up 76 percent of new diagnoses compared to transgender men at 24 percent.
In terms of region, the number of diagnoses of HIV infection among transgender adults and adolescents in the Northeast and West increased, but they remained stable in the Midwest and South.
Carl Schmid, executive director of the HIV + Hepatitis Policy Institute, told the Blade he’s “pleased that the CDC is finally recognizing the transgender community, instead of lumping them in as either ‘male’ or ‘female,’ when reporting HIV data.”
“It is something that the HIV and transgender communities have been asking for decades,” Schmid said. “With this recognition and improved data, local communities will be able to develop better HIV prevention messages and programs.”
Harper Jean Tobin, director of policy for the National Center for Transgender Equality, was critical of CDC for the length of time it took publish data on the transgender population.
“It has taken far too long for the CDC to begin reporting this critical data with this kind of depth,” Tobin said. “This data confirms past research and speaks to the high rates of discrimination, violence, poverty, unemployment, homelessness, incarceration, and barriers to health care among transgender people, and especially transgender women of color.”
Although Tobin acknowledged the rate of HIV infection is rising among transgender people across the board, she pointed out it isn’t clear “how much this reflects an increase in data quality (i.e., trans people were less likely to be recorded as trans in prior years) or actual increases in incidence.” Either way, Tobin said the data demonstrates the need for action.
“To combat these disparities, we must take action against the discrimination and stigma that drive them and invest in economic opportunity and equal access to health care for this vulnerable population,” Tobin said.
The Washington Blade has placed a request with the CDC seeking comment on reasoning behind the addition of transgender data in the HIV reports.
Germany has banned traumatising conversion therapy for people under the age of 18, and introduced penalties for adults, putting the UK and US to shame.
On Thursday evening, May 7, the Bundestag passed a law which completely bans any so-called “therapy” that aims to change the sexual orientation of minors, and the crime will carry a prison sentence of up to one year.
According to Badische, conservative German health minister Jens Spahn stressed: “Homosexuality is not a disease. Therefore the term therapy is misleading.”
Conversion therapy for those of legal age in Germany will also be banned, if a person is subjected to it involuntarily, through coercion, threats or deception. Any advertising for the debunked and traumatising practice has also been banned.
Attempts to change sexual orientation or gender identity have been proven to severe impact the mental health of LGBT+ people, increasing anxiety, depression and suicidal thoughts.
A UK survey conducted last year found that one in five people who had been through conversion therapy later attempted suicide.
Another study, published in 2019, found that “transgender people who are exposed to conversion efforts anytime in their lives have more than double the odds of attempting suicide compared with those who have never experienced efforts by professionals to convert their gender identity”.
According to Reuters, health minister Spahn, who is the Christian Democrat party’s most high-profile gay politician, said earlier on Thursday: “I want a ban which will be robust, including if it’s brought before the courts.
“Young people are being forced into conversion therapies and so it is very important that they should find support in the existence of this law: a clear signal that the state does not want this to happen.”
However, the ban does not go far enough for some political parties in Germany. The Green party called for the complete conversion therapy ban to cover young people up to the age of 26.
Green legislators said: “Only minors are to be protected from this life-endangering charlatanry.
“At the very least young people aged between 18 and 26 need comparable protection, as is shown by the experiences of coming-out and many young people’s dependence on their families.”
While Germany’s conversion therapy ban could go further, it puts countries like the US and the UK to shame – while many US states have banned the practice, America has no federal ban on conversion therapy and although all major UK health organisations have denounced the practice as damaging pseudoscience, yet the UK still has not passed a ban on conversion therapy.
The Spahr Center has an active Senior Program, and has formed a wonderful community of senior participants. Historically, we have offered two well-attended in-person Senior Discussion Groups, a monthly Mixer and quarterly luncheon. In response to Covid-19, we are now holding discussion groups twice a week over Zoom… Read the entire here
Sex and COVID-19
Questions abound about sex in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic. Out of our sense of duty to help keep our communities safe not just from sexually transmitted diseases, but other harmful pathogens, please read our somewhat graphic thoughts here, as applicable.
Virtual Pride 2020
Due to the ongoing Covid-19 emergency, The Spahr Center will not be holding its Annual Pride Picnic on Saturday, June 20. We will miss seeing many of you for that wonderful afternoon of togetherness and visibility. We are pleased to announce on Thursday, June 18 at 6:00 pm, we will hold our first ever Virtual Pride Celebration! Read more here
*Virtual* Support and Discussion Groups
Here is a current list of our social support and discussion groups happening virtually on Zoom for the month of May. For more information please click on any title or contact Bri at [email protected] or call 415-886-8554
Our LGBTQ Youth drop-in groups have gone virtual! Click here for more information, meeting dates and times.Our Syringe Access Program is an essential service and most of our sites remain open. Click here to see our weekly schedule.
The Spahr Center 5th Anniversary CelebrationWe are honored by the generosity of donors to The Spahr Center’s 5th Anniversary Fund, who contributed a total of $18,500 in much-needed support for our programs and services.
VisionariesBioMarinHorizons FoundationSid Hartman & Miguel RuelasAdvocatesWhitney Hoyt & Miranda KolbeTrue FriendsBob & Ruth DellChrist Presbyterian ChurchDana Van GorderDenny DavidGay Men of Marin (GMOM)Sara M. Taylor, AttorneyVicki MartiWing S. Wong
Having cancelled our planned May 30 Anniversary fundraising event, it is still important that we reach our fundraising goal of $25,000. We welcome our Spahrkle readers to make additional donations to our Anniversary Fund, especially as we conduct extensive outreach to our youth, senior and HIV-positive clients to assure they are doing well and have their most basic needs met during the Covid-19 pandemic. Thank you for considering a gift today!
“Sis, you love baseball like a poet,” my late brother teased me one evening, “don’t even try to get what a foul ball is!”
He was spot on. I couldn’t tell you what a foul ball is if my life depended on it. Yet, baseball is one of the things I miss most during the pandemic. What is spring without opening day? Is anything more isolating than not being able to cheer on your home team (go Nats!)?
Our country had baseball even during World War II. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt believed baseball was essential for the nation’s morale during the war. “I honestly feel that it would be best for the country to keep baseball going,” FDR said.
Thankfully, in our COVID-19 era, “A Secret Love,” a new documentary streaming on Netflix, provides hope for we who are baseball deprived. The touching doc is a fab love story involving queer history, aging and baseball. Watching it would make even Attila the Hun choke up.
“A Secret Love” is the tale of a lesbian couple who were together for 72 years — Terry Donahue, a player in the 1940s with the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League, and Pat Henschel. Because of homophobia, they were in the closet for decades. They presented themselves as “good friends” or “cousins” to everyone (including their families) except a few queer friends. The couple, native Canadians who lived for many years in Chicago, didn’t come out until they were in their 80s.
The league was created so women could play baseball while many of the male baseball players were away during World War II. Donahue played catcher for the Peoria Redwings for four seasons. After she and Herschel met in Canada, they moved to Chicago. Donahue and other players in the league were the inspiration for the movie “A League of Their Own.”
“A Secret Love,” directed by Chris Bolan, Donahue’s great-nephew, isn’t about baseball statistics or record-setting home runs. But it makes you feel the grit of the game – of baseball and of keeping your sexuality hidden from the grip of homophobia. During one game, Donahue recalls, her eyebrow got cut. She refused to stop playing and have stitches put in it. Donahue put a Band-Aid on it and kept going.
The movie “A League of Their Own” presents as hetero. Yet, I couldn’t help wondering if some of the characters in the film were queer. Donahue and Herschel make it clear that there were lesbians in the league. The league officials, they say, wanted the players to be perceived as traditionally feminine and hetero. They had to wear skirts and go to charm school. “They wanted us to look like ladies and play ball like men,” Donahue says.
Even with marriage equality, it’s still not easy to be queer – especially, for people of color and folks who are trans. In more than half of the states in the United States according to the Human Rights Campaign, you can be fired from your job if you’re LGBTQ. The Trump administration is far from being an ally to the queer community.
Yet, it’s hard to imagine how much discrimination and prejudice LGBTQ people encountered until recently. In “A Secret Love,” Donahue and Herschel (and their queer friends who are interviewed) make the homophobia they experienced in the 1940s, 50s and 60s up close and personal. You could be arrested if you wore open-fly pants, Herschel says. If you were arrested during a gay bar raid, your name could be put in the newspaper and you’d lose your job.
Despite the homophobia and the struggles of getting older (Donahue had Parkinson’s disease), the couple endured. They ran a design firm, formed a chosen family with their queer friends and got married late in their lives. In sickness and in health, for better and for worse, they were a league of their own.
When the coronavirus lockdown left a group of transgender sex workers in a beach town near Rome without work, they turned to a local Catholic priest for help to buy food.
But his parish’s resources were already stretched by the health crisis so the priest turned to the cardinal known as “the Pope’s Robin Hood” who runs the Vatican charities. He wired money to the parish for them.
“I don’t understand why this is getting so much attention,” Cardinal Konrad Krajewski told Reuters by phone on Thursday. “This is ordinary work for the Church, it’s normal. This is how the Church is a field hospital.“
Krajewski, whose formal title is “papal almoner,” or distributor of alms, said the sex workers most likely were undocumented, making it difficult for them to seek help from Italian state welfare offices.
“Everything is closed. They don’t have any resources. They went to the pastor. They could not have gone to a politician or a parliamentarian. And the pastor came to us.
“They are really in difficulty because sometimes their passports were taken away by the mafia pimps who control them,” he said. “We follow the gospel.”
Krajewski, at 56, one of the youngest cardinals in the world, said it was what Jesus would have done. And it was not the first time the Polish cardinal has made the news with his sometimes unorthodox ways of distributing the pope’s charities. Last year, he clambered down a manhole, broke a police seal, and re-connected electrical circuit breakers to restore electricity to hundreds of homeless people, many of them immigrants, living in an occupied building in Rome.
Although Krajewski ran afoul of then-Interior Minister Matteo Salvini and his anti-immigrant policies, an Italian newspaper dubbed him “The Pope’s Robin Hood.“
Although he tries to shun the limelight, Krajewski has become a minor celebrity in Rome. Since Pope Francis named him to the Vatican charity post in 2013, he became known for dressing down into simple layman’s clothes at night and bringing food to the city’s homeless in a white van.
He has also opened shelters near the Vatican where the homeless can wash, get haircuts, and receive medical care.
Idaho governor Brad Little, the person responsible for some of America’s most transphobic laws, has appealed to the Supreme Court to avoid paying for a transgender inmate’s gender confirmation surgery.
Little filed a petition after being ordered to provide surgery for 31-year-old Adree Edmo, a trans woman who is being housed in a men’s facility in Idaho.
She is serving 10 years for sexually abusing a 15-year-old boy when she was 22, and is not eligible for parole.
Edmo was diagnosed with gender dysphoria while in prison and her condition has grown so severe that she has reportedly attempted to castrate herself twice.
Denying trans woman surgery ruled ‘cruel and unusual’.
Last year a court of appeals upheld a previous ruling that denying Edmo the surgery constitutes cruel and unusual punishment.
But Little is appealing the ruling for a second time as he insists that he “should not have to pay for a procedure that is not medically necessary”.
He has vowed to “vigorously litigate” the ruling by taking it to the country’s highest court after the Ninth Circuit Court refused his request to hear the case for a third time.
“The Ninth Circuit’s decision goes against the text and original meaning of the Eighth Amendment and contradicts more than four decades of Supreme Court precedent,” Little said in a release.
“We will vigorously litigate the Ninth Circuit’s unprecedented ruling at the Supreme Court because the taxpayers of Idaho should not have to pay for a procedure that is not medically necessary.”
The state of Idaho is currently being sued by two human rights organisations thanks to a virulent anti-trans campaign spearheaded by Republican governor Brad Little.
In the midst of a pandemic, the governor signed two laws that campaigners say effectively make transgender people second-class citizens.
The first, HB509, bans transgender people from changing the gender on their birth certificates, flouting a previous a federal court ruling on the issue.
It asserts that the state will prohibit any changes to gender markers and only recognise a so-called “biology-based definition of sex” based on “immutable biological and physiological characteristics, specifically the chromosomes and internal and external reproductive anatomy”.
The second bill, HB500, bans schools and colleges from letting transgender girls from taking part in girls’ sports.
Under the “mean-spirited” law, girls whose sex is “disputed” will be required to subject themselves to invasive testing to show medical evidence of their “internal and external reproductive anatomy”.
In addition, pupils who believe they have been “disadvantaged” by their transgender classmates will be able to sue their schools for damages.
Around 20 LGBTQ immigrants, the majority of whom are transgender women from countries throughout Latin America, are isolated and protected from the threat of the coronavirus in the Jardín de las Mariposas shelter in the Mexican border city of Tijuana.
Jaime Marín Rocha, the shelter’s legal representative, told the Washington Blade in an exclusive interview the shelter has implemented new hygiene and cleaning procedures that include the use of masks, gloves, antibacterial gels, disinfectants and bleach in order to stop the spread of the virus and to protect the health of its residents and clients.
“The local government in Tijuana has not supported us a lot,” lamented Marin. “Only Tijuana’s Health Department came to inspect the facilities. They recommended ways for us to improve, but they left very pleased with its cleanliness.”
All of the refugees who live at the shelter are currently in good health and take all social distancing measures very seriously.
One can appreciate the cleaning procedures the shelter’s residents have done by looking at some of the posts on its Facebook page. Marín also explained the shelter has set aside a part of the house in which anyone who develops coronavirus symptoms can be isolated.
“We would keep them there until we can bring them to the hospital if necessary,” he said.
Marín is nevertheless worried because the shelter does not have a doctor. Refugees only have health insurance coverage for the first three months after their arrival to the country.
“What we want to do is create a fund for people who don’t have health insurance, because when that period ends we have no way to deal with a situation that could develop,” said Marín. “We have to look for support from other organizations in the medical field that can assist us. We really need help with that.”
Jordi Raich, director of the International Committee of the Red Cross for Mexico and Central America, confirmed it is often difficult for immigrants, who are exposed to the disease like any other person, to access the public health care system or humanitarian assistance. They are often unable to receive help because they are victims of violence and discrimination.
“It is important to highlight the fact that the presence of migrants does not generate a higher risk for the disease,” said Raich. “They are exposed to the virus in the same way as nationals from any country.”
Marín said a psychologist worked with the shelter until they had an accident a few days ago.
“We have also been a bit helpless in that regard,” he said. “We would ideally have a psychological program to help overcome many of the traumas that these immigrants have because of the persecution that they have suffered in their countries of origin because of their sexual orientation.”
Most shelter residents live with HIV
Alerts that coronavirus cases among LGBTQ people have skyrocketed since it was declared a global pandemic, combined with the fact this population has a higher percentage of people with HIV and cancer who are more susceptible to the virus, compound Marín’s concerns.
The National LGBT Cancer Network in an open letter signed by the Human Rights Campaign, Lambda Legal, GLAAD and other groups expressed their concern as the community confronts barriers when it tries to access medical care.
“Discriminatory attitudes are commonplace among medical professionals and some people avoid or delay visiting the doctor for this reason,” they said.
There is additional concern based on the rate of tobacco use among this population that is 50 percent higher than the general population. The coronavirus is a respiratory disease that has been shown to be particularly harmful to smokers.
Another factor that also increases vulnerability to the virus is the higher rates of HIV and cancer among LGBTQ people, which means there are more people with compromised immune systems that leave them more vulnerable to the pandemic. There are also many cases of people who don’t know they are living with HIV.
Marín says 95 percent of Jardin de las Mariposas’ residents live with HIV, which makes it necessary to take extra precautions. As a result, Marín said the shelter for the time being will not accept new residents.
“We hope to reopen our doors soon,” he said in a Facebook post. “We are following government guidelines to guarantee your personal safety.”
In order to counter all of these logical and economic challenges, Jardín de las Mariposas has received donations from several non-profit organizations that are supporting them during this health emergency. Families Belong Together; the Refugee Health Alliance; the Minority Humanitarian Foundation; the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees; Alight and the Organization for Refuge, Asylum and Migration have extended a supportive hand to those who need it most.
ORAM Executive Director Steve Roth pointed out to the Blade that his organization supports shelters like Jardín de las Mariposas in three ways: “With products to help protect against the coronavirus, information about the virus and how to protect oneself from it and programs to help residents during these difficult times.”
“We are working together with our partner Alight on this,” said Roth. “In the case of Jardín de las Mariposas we bought most of the products on Amazon and sent them directly to the shelter. We had already sent soap, disinfectant, gloves, disinfectant wipes, trash bags, first aid kits, toilet paper, etc. They more or less have enough for the next month and we are going to do another order soon.”
Jardín de las Mariposas is in a large and comfortable house with many bedrooms and is located about 10 minutes from downtown Tijuana.
Local media reports indicate the border city has more than 500 coronavirus cases. Marín said the city in Baja California’s northern state reacted very late, compared to the majority of countries that had already closed their borders.
“Mexico responded very late,” he said.
The city is now under lockdown and the U.S. has temporarily stopped asylum seekers from entering the U.S. The Mexico-U.S. border is open only for essential commercial traffic and authorized people.
Mexican Foreign Secretary Marcelo Ebrard, for his part, said that his country will not accept migrants and asylum seekers from third countries who are returned to Mexican territory from the U.S. by the Trump administration
Meanwhile, the nearly 20 LGBTQ immigrants must remain at Jardín de las Mariposas until the lockdown ends. Marín has described the shelter as “a dream we forged by the hard experiences of being different in a society that excludes and points out those who do not accept social labels because they know how to love differently.”
Jardín de las Mariposas is a non-profit organization founded by Yolanda Rocha, Marín’s mother and current director, on April 6, 2011. It always receives anyone who asks for help with addiction or emotional problems because of their sexual orientation with love, respect and without cost.
It is the only center in Tijuana that openly welcomes the LGBTQ community. The organization has lately focused on providing help to asylum seekers and refugees because of increased immigration to the U.S.
A bicameral group of congressional lawmakers led by Rep. Dina Titus (D-Nev.) and Sen. Edward Markey (D-Mass.) are calling on the Trump administration to ensure international efforts to assist with the COVID-19 pandemic overseas include relief for LGBTQ people.
In a letter dated May 7 obtained exclusively by the Washington Blade, the 47 members of Congress — all Democrats — make the case the U.S. response to the coronavirus overseas “will be seen as a test of our country’s commitment to the protection of human rights and American values of fairness and equality.”
The lawmakers urge the State Department and U.S. Agency for International Development to protect LGBTQ human rights overseas during the coronavirus crisis in three ways:
First, the letter calls on the Trump administration to “intervene at senior levels with governments that are using the COVID-19 crisis to persecute or discriminate against LGBTQI and other marginalized communities.”
Also, the lawmakers seek the inclusion of LGBTQ people in both short- and long-term response and recovery programs in addition to calling on partner countries to adopt the same approach.
“Restrictions aimed at preventing the spread of COVID-19 have placed a large burden on those in the informal economy, cutting off income streams and preventing them from obtaining food or secure shelter,” the letter says. “As a result, the pandemic has heightened the vulnerability of LGBTQI and other marginalized populations to poverty, food insecurity and homelessness.”
Finally, the lawmakers call for access to health services the United States provides overseas, such as “treatment for HIV and other COVID-exacerbating conditions, as well as other necessary healthcare services, including sexual and reproductive health.”
“LGBTQI people and other vulnerable populations face stigma and discrimination in obtaining healthcare services, especially in countries where same- sex sexual conduct or non-normative gender expression is criminalized,” the letter says. “This hinders access to lifesaving healthcare services and puts their lives at even greater risk during this pandemic.”
The State Department declined to comment on the letter, citing a general practice of no comment on congressional correspondence. USAID didn’t immediately respond to a request to comment.