Pride Month and the Struggle for Visibility

While the last two decades have witnessed a rapid change in public sentiment and legal empowerment for the LGBTQ+ community, health plans are still lagging behind

June 1970 may seem like a long time ago, but next year will mark only the 55^th anniversary of the first Pride Month celebration. In 1998, nearly 30 years later, President Bill Clinton signed an executive order protecting federal employees from discrimination based on sexual orientation. A year later, the President declared June as “Gay and Lesbian Pride Month”.

Taken together, these developments were quite substantial for the LGBTQ+ community, but ultimately narrow in scope. Protections for these individuals in the public space, including from work-based discrimination, were few and far between. However, in the early 2000s, public polling data from Gallup began to detect a shift in public sentiment and acceptance of this community, ultimately heralding the 2015 Supreme Court decision that would recognize the legality of marriages between same-sex individuals.

Since then, the LGBTQ+ community has advocated for increased access to family planning tools, including reproductive medicine, yet little progress has been made. To date, only 15 states mandate that health plans provide fertility treatment for all couples unable to conceive naturally, regardless of sexual orientation. More recently however, an updated definition of infertility from the American Society for Reproductive Medicine may usher in a dramatic increase in access to reproductive medicine for all couples.  With speed of new developments in this area seemingly increasing each year, it can be difficult to keep track of it all.

This Pride Month, we invite you to explore ProgenyHealth’s whitepaper Pride and Parenthood: Exploring Parenting Paths and Possibilities for the LGBTQ+ Community. Not only does it provide a history of the issues LGBTQ+ couples have faced on their journey to parenthood, but it also gives guidance and recommendations for health plans and legislators alike. Additionally, we are proud to share a special Pride Month message from ProgenyHealth leadership:

Happy Pride Month from all of us at ProgenyHealth!