(RepublicanInformer.com)- In recent years, the federal government and elected officials have ushered in inclusive language such as “birthing person” rather than “pregnant woman” or “mother,” but there is no data on how many transgender people give birth in the United States every year.
In the 2022 fiscal year budget, the Biden administration changed the word “mothers” to “birthing people,” prompting conservatives to complain that mothers were being canceled. During a Democratic oversight committee hearing last year, Democratic Missouri Rep. Cori Bush referred to mothers as “birthing people,” and the chief medical officer of the New York City Department of Health used the exact phrase in a tweet just last month.
Top corporations have embraced the push to be more inclusive when referring to mothers, with Apple releasing a “pregnant man” emoji last month.
However, there is no data on how many transgender men give birth each year in the United States.
Fox News Digital contacted the Department of Health and Human Services by phone and email to inquire about data on transgender pregnancies and births but received no response. For a rough estimate, Fox News Digital reached out to the nine largest hospitals and hospital systems in the United States, but only one hospital representative responded, saying Providence Health does not “have this data available to share.”
A request for comment on such data was also ignored by the World Professional Association for Transgender Health. WPATH is a non-profit organization that has established “Standards of Care” for health professionals working with transgender people, endorsed by many medical organizations.
According to NBC News, in 2019, there is no data on such births because medical systems track pregnant transgender men as females.
Other countries, such as Australia, have kept track of transgender pregnancies, recording 22 out of 35,000 births during the 2018-19 fiscal year.
In recent years, the number of transgender people in the United States has risen. Researchers at UCLA’s Williams Institute estimated that there were 1.4 million transgender people in 2016, accounting for about 0.6 percent of all adults in the country and more than double the number reported a decade ago.
According to a 2017 study conducted by researchers at the UCLA School of Law’s Williams Institute, approximately 150,000 American youths identify as transgender.
Though exact figures on how many transgender people give birth in the United States each year are unknown, a Rutgers University study published in 2019 estimated that “unintended pregnancies occur in up to 30% of transgender men.”
The issue of transgender health care has been at the forefront of political debate in recent months. Assistant Secretary for Health Rachel Levine, the highest-ranking transgender person in the U.S. government, recently received pushback for a blanket claim that “there is no argument” about “gender-affirming care” among pediatricians and doctors specializing in adolescents. A handful of Republican governors have signed legislation on transgender issues. For example, South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster signed a law requiring students to compete in sports leagues based on their gender at birth.
President Biden slammed such laws earlier this year and pledged support for transgender Americans.
In a video message on Transgender Day of Visibility in March, Biden said that the onslaught of anti-transgender state laws attacking them and their families is simply wrong. His administration is standing up for them against all these hateful bills. And he’s committed to advancing transgender equality in the classroom, on the playing field, at work, in the military, and the housing and health care systems.”
