TWO Praises New York For Banning Conversion Therapy for Minors and Cracking Down on Insurance Providers | Truth Wins Out

Truth Wins Out praised New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo today for using his Executive Authority to prohibit the destructive practice of “conversion therapy,” a fraudulent and ineffective attempt to combine prayer and discredited psychobabble to change teenagers from gay to straight. According to CNN, “Saturday’s announcement bans public and private health care insurers from covering the practice in New York State. It also prohibits New York mental health facilities from conducting the practice on minors.”

From the NYTimes, a bit more detail,

Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo of New York on Saturday announced a series of measures intended to eliminate so-called conversion therapy, a practice that claims the ability to reverse same-sex attraction in some people but that has been widely discredited by scientists and criticized by gay-rights groups.

Mr. Cuomo’s plan relies on economic incentives meant to discourage conversion therapy’s use on young people. Insurers in New York, for instance, will now be prohibited from covering the cost of such therapy for anyone under 18.

That action — issued through the State Financial Services Department — would be combined with a new regulation from the State Health Department that would prohibit the use of Medicaid to pay for conversion therapy. Centers overseen by the State Office of Mental Health would also be barred from providing conversion therapy to minors, according to the governor’s office.

Taken as a whole, the new regulations would severely restrict conversion therapy, which Mr. Cuomo called “a hateful and fundamentally flawed practice” in a statement.

Why it has come to Executive Authority,

Last year, the New York State Assembly, which is controlled by Democrats, passed a bill that would have banned mental health practitioners from performing conversion therapy on minors, labeling the practice a form of professional misconduct that could put medical licenses at risk. The bill stalled in the State Senate, where Republicans hold a slim majority.

TWO Praises New York For Banning Conversion Therapy for Minors and Cracking Down on Insurance Providers | Truth Wins Out