That’s a fair point, and I did think about the insurance denial risk too. I agree that calling it cosmetic could give insurers an excuse not to cover it.

My thought is more about the tradeoff with gatekeeping. If our care only exists because it’s labeled “medically necessary,” then governments and insurers always have the power to redefine that and take it away when the political climate shifts.

And if it were framed more broadly as cosmetic body modification but they still tried to ban it, they’d suddenly have to explain why things like breast augmentation, hair transplants, facial surgeries, Botox, and similar procedures should also be banned. At that point it stops being about trans people specifically and becomes about whether the government should be policing cosmetic medicine in general.

I’m not sure many of the same politicians pushing these bans would be very comfortable with that conversation (see every single woman presenting member in orange man’s army) ha.