September 11, 2024
The lawsuit alleges that the insurance giant has covered similar procedures for cisgender patients.
Three transgender women have filed a lawsuit against U.S. health insurance company Aetna, alleging that their claims for gender-affirming facial surgeries have for years been unlawfully denied.
The three women — Binah Gordon, Kay Mayers, and anonymous plaintiff S.N. — filed suit in Connecticut on September 10, each asserting that Aetna improperly denied their claims for “medically necessary gender-affirming facial reconstruction surgeries.” The plaintiffs are represented by the law firms of Wardenski PC and Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll PLLC, as well as Advocates for Trans Equality (A4TE), which was formed in a merger between two national trans rights organizations earlier this year.
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This is only the latest lawsuit leveling discrimination claims against the insurance giant. In 2021, Aetna settled a similar lawsuit (also filed in part by Cohen Milstein) by announcing it would consider trans women’s breast augmentation surgeries to be medically necessary — a reform that clearly was not equally applied to facial surgeries in the aftermath of that settlement. Since then, however, lawsuits against Aetna have surged on multiple other fronts. In the space of one week in October 2023, Aetna was served with 21 separate lawsuits from breast cancer survivors who said the company refused to pay for their reconstructive surgeries. Earlier this year, Bridges Health Partners in Pennsylvania sued Aetna for breach of contract; in May, the company agreed to settle another lawsuit that alleged the company had discriminated against LGBTQ+ families seeking fertility treatments, creating a $2 million reimbursement fund for the impacted parties.
Read A Group of Trans Women Are Suing Aetna For Facial Feminization Insurance Coverage.