Lawsuit Alleges Oregon Health Authority Illegally Withheld Data on Child Sex Changes

The Oregon Health Authority is facing a lawsuit for allegedly withholding data on child sex change interventions, in violation of the First Amendment.

The Oregon Health Authority (OHA) maintains a program, the All Payer All Claims (APAC) reporting program, designed to provide the public and policymakers with important healthcare information. Through APAC, the OHA collects healthcare claims and enrollment data, as well as other data related to healthcare costs and utilization.

Oregon law requires the OHA to make APAC data available to healthcare consumers in order to empower them to make informed healthcare decisions.

In February 2025, Paul Terdal, a visiting fellow at Do No Harm, requested APAC data for the purposes of researching “the efficacy and incidence of gender-related medical treatments for children.” Terdal is a volunteer health consumer advocate who has been advocating for access to safe mental and behavioral healthcare for 20 years.

Terdal’s consultancy, Terdal Consulting, had previously requested APAC data from the OHA and had those requests approved.

However, the OHA denied the February request, justifying its decision on the grounds that releasing the data would violate the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act or HIPAA.

This excuse, the lawsuit alleges, doesn’t add up. While HIPAA is intended to protect patients’ personal health information, the lawsuit states that the data in question meets all the statutory de-identification requirements.

Moreover, according to the lawsuit, the OHA had received 25 requests for APAC since 2020, and had fulfilled each and every one – that is, until Terdal’s request, which just so happened to involve the politically fraught issue of child sex change interventions. If the APAC data does not comply with HIPAA, as the OHA claims, then the OHA would have needed to report breaches of protected information for each past release, per federal regulations. Yet the OHA has not reported any such breaches.

Internal OHA emails, obtained through a public records request, show that OHA staff and executives were concerned about Terdal’s past statements to the media and legislators, and about the “risk” that he would do so again.  Before declaring their own database to be out of compliance with HIPAA, they debated requiring him to sign a contract restricting publication of his results or redacting the database to prevent him from completing his research.

And there’s another wrinkle; Terdal has long advocated against Oregon health authorities’ endorsement of the discredited WPATH SOC-8 as the state’s official “standard of care” for treatment of pediatric gender dysphoria, arguing that it lacked sufficient evidentiary backing. Terdal’s advocacy culminated in a lengthy exposé by the Lund Report, detailing how the OHA silenced its own experts’ concerns about the clinical evidence and integrity of the research behind WPATH.

In addition, Terdal recently authored an article in National Review, citing OHA data to show evidence of pediatric medical transition, including surgical procedures.

“In 2021, the Oregon Health Authority provided me with a copy of its insurance claims database for the year 2019. The database covers the private health insurance and Medicaid payments for all medical procedures of 92 percent of the state’s population. This includes gender-affirming treatment. In 2019, two biological girls had their ovaries and uteruses removed because of their gender distress. They were just 17 years old. Four 18-year-olds also received genital surgeries.”

The lawsuit alleges that the denial of Terdal’s request was politically motivated and is evidence of viewpoint discrimination; by denying Terdal the ability to engage in constitutionally protected speech, the OHA violated Terdal’s First Amendment rights.

“Oregon’s officials don’t have to agree with me, but they simply cannot use the power of the state to punish me or to deny me information that will help Oregonians make up their own minds,” Terdal told The Center Square.

Do No Harm agrees. This information should be available to all, so that policymakers and the public alike can take the necessary steps to protect children from the harms of dangerous, experimental medical interventions.

Do No Harm Files Complaint Against UConn School of Medicine for Operating Discriminatory Externship

RICHMOND, VA; August 27, 2025 – Today, Do No Harm filed a complaint with the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights (DOE-OCR) against the University of Connecticut (UConn) School of Medicine for operating a racially discriminatory externship program. 

“By marketing the externship as a ‘pipeline for students of color,’ UConn’s School of Medicine isn’t even trying to hide its racially discriminatory behavior,” said Stanley Goldfarb, MD, Chairman of Do No Harm. “The school has put identity politics above merit, excellence, and skill. The program is a clear violation of federal law and strips qualified candidates of opportunities to progress in the medical field. Knowing the Department of Education takes these sorts of violations very seriously, we hope our complaint leads to an investigation of UConn’s discriminatory practices. Do No Harm remains committed to driving out divisive ideology and restoring integrity to America’s healthcare system.”

Click here to read the complaint. 

Background

UConn’s School of Medicine operates the Visiting Externship for Students Underrepresented in Medicine, and describes it as a “pipeline for students of color.” The program allows fourth-year medical students from other schools to enroll as visiting students at UConn, where they complete externships in a range of fields. However, to be eligible, the student must belong to a group UConn deems “underrepresented in medicine.”

On the application, students must explain how their “background as underrepresented in medicine” makes them “competitive” for the externship. Additionally, a student of color can apply without also identifying as LGBTQ, disabled, or low-income, while other applicants must provide additional identity qualifications.

Since UConn is a federally funded university, Do No Harm is asking DOE-OCR to investigate the school for violating Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, which prohibits federal funds from being spent in “any fashion which encourages, entrenches, subsidizes or results in racial discrimination.”

Do No Harm, established in April 2022, has rapidly gained recognition and made significant strides in its mission to safeguard healthcare from ideological threats. With over 30,000 members, including doctors, nurses, physicians, and concerned citizens across all 50 states and 14 countries, DNH has achieved over 10,000 media hits in top-tier publications and garnered widespread attention through numerous broadcast news appearances.

Children’s Hospital Scrubs All Mention Of Notorious Gender Clinic Director From Website

Medical watchdog organization Do No Harm listed the CHLA gender clinic as one of the “12 worst-offending children’s hospitals promoting sex change treatments for minors” in its Stop The Harm database which provides information about the services provided at pediatric gender clinics across America.

“I think we’re saving a lot of children from a lot of harm,” Do No Harm Board Chairman Dr. Stanley Goldfarb told the DCNF.

“That’s what this is about. There’s no evidence that these maneuvers improve a child’s psychological well-being and there’s a lot of evidence that they’re harmful,” Goldfarb added.

Read the full story at the Daily Caller.


Treat Medical School Applicants as People, Not Pawns

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Over the past few years, Do No Harm has documented the Association of American Medical Colleges’ (AAMC) various initiatives aimed at advancing discriminatory and divisive practices in medical education. These include efforts to inject the consideration of race into the medical school admissions process.

Yet the use of race in admissions is ultimately downstream from the more innocuous – but nonetheless problematic – view that the medical school admissions process should not simply select for the most accomplished and meritorious applicants, but should instead advance particular ideological goals.

An applicant’s character is relevant to their future medical career, and considering such factors isn’t necessarily worrying. Concerns arise, however, when the admissions process is geared toward achieving social goals (distinct from excellence in medicine) and applicants are viewed for their contributions toward those goals, rather than on their own merits as future physicians. 

The AAMC is quite explicit about the fact that it does view the admissions process as a means to achieve certain desired social and political goals, as evidenced by its resources on its “holistic review” philosophy.

For instance, it lauds the UC-Davis School of Medicine for using strategies “to increase enrollment of historically underrepresented and excluded students and to achieve institutional community health goals.”

And, although the AAMC has moved to distance itself from its more explicit endorsements of racial discrimination, its 2023 amicus brief in support of race-conscious medical school argued that “diversity in the education of the Nation’s physicians and other healthcare professionals is a medical imperative.”

This admissions philosophy is further reinforced by the actual application materials students submit when applying to medical school, and is reflected in the AAMC’s application workbook, which is designed to prepare students to submit applications through the American Medical College Application Service (AMCAS), the AAMC’s centralized medical school application processing service.

The workbook encourages applicants to submit information about themselves that is not relevant to their qualifications as applicants, or for any related administrative purpose.

For instance, applicants have the option to list their “gender identity,” with options including “Genderqueer/Gender non-conforming” and “non-binary” and “agender.”

Applicants can also choose to list their preferred pronouns, with options including “They/Them/Theirs” and “Ze/Hir/Hirs.”

Applicants are further asked a series of questions about their background, including whether they grew up in an area they “believe” was “medically under-served.” There is not an objective metric of “medically under-served” included in the workbook.

The workbook further asks applicants about their family income levels and whether their immediate family ever used federal or state assistance programs.

This interest in applicants’ background extends to questions about “impactful experiences” applicants have undergone, which the AAMC justifies on the basis of promoting “holistic review.”

The ideological flavor to these questions is best crystallized in a question allowing students to submit their experiences engaging in “social justice” advocacy.

Why one’s social justice advocacy is relevant to their ability to practice medicine, or their quality as an applicant, is not explained.

The workbook further reminds applicants to submit their scores on the PREview exam, a test ostensibly aimed at measuring skills and competencies related to professionalism, which is increasingly becoming mandatory at more and more schools.

As Do No Harm previously reported, one of the goals of the PREview exam is to promote “inclusivity” and “level the playing field” for applicants. The exam was also assessed by “experts” in DEI.

“In discussing the exam with our DEI constituents, the sentiment has always been that it would help level the playing field for applicants,” said David Acosta, MD, AAMC chief diversity and inclusion officer, in a 2022 statement.

All these facts together paint a compelling picture: the AMCAS application (and the AAMC more generally) appears less interested in recognizing individual achievement than in engineering outcomes through “holistic review.” By burying schools in layers of subjective social data, the process dilutes focus on what truly matters: intellectual ability, clinical promise, and dedication to patient care.

The comprehensive nature of the application is not neutral; it is a deliberate attempt to elevate social and political factors above merit. Medical education – and ultimately, patient care – will suffer if the next generation of doctors is chosen on the basis of activism rather than excellence.

After Do No Harm’s Lawsuit, ‘Black Doctors Directory’ Will Be Open to All Races

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RICHMOND, VA; August 25, 2025 – Do No Harm is pleased to announce that a Philadelphia-area physician directory, formerly known as the Black Doctors Directory, is now the Community Health and Wellness Directory. Ability to participate in the Community Health and Wellness Directory is not determined on the basis of race.

This after Do No Harm sued Penn Medicine, the Consortium of DEI Health Educators, and WURD Radio alleging that the directory excluded doctors based on race. Do No Harm argued that the directory should be open to all, including doctors of all races who treat black patients and work to improve their health. That litigation will now end.

“We are grateful that the directory is open to physicians of all races,” said Stanley Goldfarb, MD, Chairman of Do No Harm. “Do No Harm has long opposed ‘racial concordance,’ a thoroughly debunked theory that only breeds suspicion and prejudice. When medical providers prioritize expertise and high-quality care, patients will see better health outcomes.”

Do No Harm, established in April 2022, has rapidly gained recognition and made significant strides in its mission to safeguard healthcare from ideological threats. It has over 30,000 members, including doctors, nurses, physicians, and concerned citizens across all 50 states and 14 countries.

American Physical Therapy Association Ditches Discriminatory Scholarship Programs

The American Physical Therapy Association (APTA) appears to have ditched discriminatory eligibility criteria from two of its scholarship programs.

In January, Do No Harm reported on two of the APTA’s discriminatory scholarship programs, financed through the organization’s Minority Scholarship Fund.

These included APTA’s Faculty Development Scholarship Award, which provided a monetary award to “minority faculty pursuing a postprofessional doctoral degree.”

The award’s eligibility criteria stated that applicants had to be “members of one of the following racial/ethnic minority groups: African American or Black, Asian, Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander, American Indian/Alaska Native and Hispanic/Latino.”

The APTA also operated the PT Student and PTA Student Awards program, which likewise required applicants to be members of the aforementioned racial groups to receive the award.

These programs now appear to have been scrubbed from the APTA’s website. 

While the Minority Scholarship Fund webpage is still up on the APTA website, its information page now links to an awards page titled “Access and Opportunity Scholarship Fund Awards.”

That page contains revised descriptions of both the Faculty Development Scholarship Award and the PT Student and PTA Student Awards, which lists several eligibility criteria, none of which make reference to diversity, minority status, underrepresented groups, or any other factor that would be used to discriminate on the basis of race.

The webpage that previously included the eligibility criteria for the discriminatory awards programs likewise redirects to the “Access and Opportunity Scholarship Fund Awards’ page.

Additionally, the “Honors & Awards Programs” webpage, which previously linked to the discriminatory Faculty Development Scholarship Award and PT Student and PTA Student Awards, no longer mentions either of these programs.

These changes appear to have occurred at some point within the past two months; the webpages for the discriminatory awards programs were live as recently as June.

Do No Harm credits the APTA for eliminating the divisive, discriminatory eligibility criteria from its scholarship programs. 

These opportunities should be open to all, not restricted to individuals on the basis of their race.

There’s a DEI Emergency in the Medical Field

In recent years, states across the country, as well as the federal government, have taken action targeting divisive and discriminatory DEI programs in the medical field.

This has likely prompted some institutions, such as the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC), to scrub the more overt references to racially discriminatory practices from their public websites. The American College of Surgeons, perhaps seeing which way the winds were blowing, attempted to rebrand itself and downplay its diversity commitments.

These changes appear to be largely cosmetic rather than a collective “Road to Damascus” moment, but they do signify a growing awareness among medical institutions that their radical ideological activism is no longer palatable to the public, policymakers, and healthcare professionals alike.

However, many medical associations still haven’t gotten the memo.

The National Association of EMS Physicians (NAEMSP) broadcasts its commitment to DEI loud and proud, maintaining a DEI committee and multiple resources expounding on the virtues of DEI ideology.

In its “Essential Principles to Create an Equitable, Inclusive, and Diverse EMS Workforce and Work Environment” document, the NAEMSP lists multiple principles that appear facially discriminatory.

These include:

“Hire more diverse workforce by intentionally recruiting from marginalized communities.”

“Increase EMS career pathway and mentorship programs within underrepresented minorities (URM) communities and URM-predominant schools starting at a young age to promote EMS as an achievable profession.”

“Require EMS advisory boards whose composition reflects the communities they serve and regularly audit membership to ensure inclusion.”

Taken together, these principles represent a fairly overt commitment to engage in discriminatory behavior, using the guise of “diversity” and “equity” to inject dangerous and racist influences and quotas into the recruitment and hiring process.

And from the principles’ citations, it’s clear the NAEMSP includes racial minorities in its definition of “URM.”

Moreover, the principles commit the NAEMSP to engage in forms of social justice activism, including a focus on combating “systemic racism.” Examples include:

“Increase knowledge and self-awareness of implicit/unconscious bias and acts of microaggression through established educational and training programs (i.e., anti- racism, upstander, and allyship) such that individuals recognize and mitigate their own biases and can act as allies.”

“Examine policies that promote systemic racism and revise policies, procedures, and rules to promote a diverse, inclusive, and equitable environment.”

“Design research and quality improvement initiatives related to health disparities in EMS that are focused on racial/ethnic and gender inequities and include URM community leaders as essential stakeholders involved in all stages of research development and implementation.”

The NAEMSP has also evangelized these ideals through a number of town halls and webinars.

One event, titled “Cultivating A Culturally Competent Culture: Building Diverse and Inclusive EMS Agencies,” includes an action plan urging attendees to diversify their workplaces.

As recently as June 2025, the NAEMSP’s DEI committee hosted a happy hour and virtual recruiting event.

The NAEMSP’s open endorsement of hiring and recruitment practices that favor certain groups on the basis of race or identity is promoting discrimination, full stop. 

This undermines the very foundation of medicine, which should prioritize competence, training, and skill above all else. Patients deserve to be treated by the best doctors and EMS professionals, not by those selected to satisfy ideological and identity-based goals.

North Carolina offers GOP road map for malpractice reform in minor gender transition cases

Dr. Jared Ross, a senior fellow at the Do No Harm medical advocacy group, told the Washington Examiner that rushing adolescents into irreversible interventions without a comprehensive mental health evaluation violates basic medical ethics. 

“If you ignore trauma, depression, or other psychiatric conditions and move straight to hormones or surgery, you are not practicing evidence-based medicine,” Ross said. “These lawsuits are a predictable result.”

Read the full story at The Washington Examiner.

Corewell Health Asks Employees to Swear Fealty to DEI

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Corewell Health, one of the largest health systems operating in Michigan, is asking its employees to sign a document effectively pledging their belief in DEI.

The health system maintains its “Corewell Health Code of Excellence,” a set of standards intended to govern professional conduct within the health system.

“This Code of Excellence (Code) applies system-wide to all employed and non-employed team members (collectively referred to as team members) including providers, contractors, consultants, agents, students, volunteers and suppliers,” the document states.

A physician source with knowledge of the matter said that signing the document was mandatory for healthcare providers working with Corewell Health.

However, the document contains a concerning strain of identity politics.

Item 4 of the Code of Excellence includes the following affirmation:

“We value diversity, equity and inclusion. We embrace a diverse and inclusive organizational culture that fosters respect for all. At the same time, we acknowledge that inequities persist in our communities. We pledge to listen deeply and engage authentically with those impacted by systemic racism, so we can partner with others toward the goal of achieving health equity.”

In other words, Corewell Health is pushing its employees to sign a pledge affirming their belief in DEI.

And failing to do so comes with very severe consequences.

The attestation attached to the Code of Excellence reads as follows:

“If I violate the Code or other policies or procedures applicable to me as a Corewell Health team member, I may be subject to performance correction up to and including termination of employment or other relationship with Corewell Health and any of its affiliates, including Priority Health.”

Thus, Corewell Health team members must adhere to the tenets of DEI, or else risk losing their jobs.

This may sound extreme, but when compared with other Corewell Health initiatives, it’s clear its par for the course.

For instance, Corewell Health operates its Minority and Underrepresented Scholarship Programs, which includes the Health Equity and Leadership (HEAL) Scholars Program and the Minority Visiting Scholars Program.

The HEAL Scholars Program provides resident physicians with a $10,000 scholarship their first year in the program and a $5,000 scholarship each year thereafter throughout residency.

However, the program requires participants to be members of certain racial backgrounds.

“Scholars must be from an underrepresented minority background (African American/Black, Hispanic/Latino, American Indian/Alaska Native or Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander),” the program description states.

The HEAL Scholars Program was the subject of multiple federal civil rights complaints filed by Do No Harm Senior Fellow Mark J. Perry.

The initial complaint alleged that, since Corewell Health received ample federal funding, the program’s racially discriminatory eligibility criteria violated Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (which prohibits recipients of federal funding from discriminating on the basis of race, color, or national origin).

Meanwhile, the second complaint against Michigan State University alleged that the university’s funding and promotion of the HEALS Scholars Program likewise violated Title VI, essentially making the HEALS Scholars Program a joint venture in illegal discrimination.

Corewell also operates the Minority Visiting Scholars Program, which requires applicants to be from “an underrepresented group,” which includes “marginalized racial and ethnic groups, LGBTQIA+ people, and individuals with disabilities.”

Simply put, it’s disturbing that any organization, much less a major healthcare organization, would impose this ideological oath on its employees and embody these ideals in its discriminatory programs.

These concepts are more than just trivial distractions from Corewell Health’s mission to provide quality medical care; they are dangerous, and lead to direct discrimination in healthcare.

Report: Human Rights Campaign pressures transgender procedures on minors

The Human Rights Campaign pressures children’s hospitals into performing transgender procedures on minors, according to a Do No Harm report.

Do No Harm is a medical organization dedicated to keeping identity politics out of all areas of the medical field, while the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) is an LGBTQ rights group.

Do No Harm medical director Dr. Kurt Miceli and co-author of the group’s report said in a statement obtained by The Center Square: “It is time to expose and root out the Human Rights Campaign’s vast influence over healthcare systems.”

“Our report sheds light on how the HRC weaponized its so-called ‘Healthcare Equality Index’ to pressure pediatric hospitals into chemically and surgically castrating children,” Miceli said.

Read the full story at The Center Square.

Report Exposes How Gender-Extremism Group Pressures Hospitals To Damage Children

A new report details how the Human Rights Campaign, the nation’s largest LGBT lobby, pressures hospitals into child genital mutilation and castration.

A new report from Do No Harm (DNH) titled, “How the Human Rights Campaign’s Healthcare Equality Index Infects Pediatric Hospitals with Gender Ideology,” details how HRC and its charity branch, the Human Rights Campaign Foundation (HRCF), uses a scoring index to measure a hospital’s “compliance with various tenets of gender ideology.” Hospitals lose points if they do not offer or encourage dangerous and anti-human transgender procedures such as male genital amputation, breast amputation, and fake genital construction for children.

Read the full story at The Federalist.

EXCLUSIVE: Trans Org’s Chokehold On Children’s Hospitals Exposed In New Report

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A medical watchdog organization is calling on hospitals to cut ties with a transgender activist group that awards healthcare systems for promoting gender ideology and child sex-changes.

Do No Harm released a 36-page report on Aug. 14 titled, “How The Human Rights Campaign’s Healthcare Equality Index Infects Pediatric Hospitals With Gender Ideology,” outlining how the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) influences hospitals to adopt ideologically driven policies such as requiring leadership to undergo LGBTQ+ training, asking patients if their “gender identity” differs from their sex and offering employees insurance coverage for child sex-change interventions, such as puberty blockers.

“It is time to expose and root out the Human Rights Campaign’s vast influence over healthcare systems. Our report sheds light on how the HRC weaponized its so-called ‘Healthcare Equality Index’ to pressure pediatric hospitals into chemically and surgically castrating children,” Dr. Kurt Miceli, Medical Director at Do No Harm and co-author of the report, told the DCNF.

“By capitulating to the HRC’s political scheme, hospitals have utterly betrayed patients, especially children struggling with gender dysphoria. If health systems care about providing high-quality pediatric care, then they should distance themselves from the HRC and its Index,” Miceli said. “Medical professionals must learn the truth about pediatric gender medicine and dare to speak out against the harmful model imposed by the HRC and other ideologues.”

Read the full article at The Daily Caller.

Duke Health Ditches DEI-Infused Anti-Racism Pledge

Like many healthcare institutions in the wake of the 2020 “racial reckoning,” the Duke University Health System (Duke Health) adopted a pledge that it advertised as a commitment to stand against racism.

That doesn’t sound so bad, right?

Well, upon closer inspection, the pledge was rife with commitments that forced healthcare to take a backseat to ideology.

These included the following items:

“We recognize our own implicit biases and actively seek, listen, and respond to feedback from others as part of our personal growth and development.”

“We are guided by science and know that excellent research and health care cannot happen without equity. To deliver the most effective care, we must ensure equitable access to treatments and care, so that every individual can achieve optimal health.”

“We commit to educating ourselves and the next generations of health care, science, and technology professionals to acknowledge, counter, and ultimately eliminate racism and racial inequities.”

“We use our expertise to study the impact of racial injustice on health outcomes. We reduce health disparities by actively engaging members of diverse populations to guide and lead our research.”

As you may have noticed, some of this is at odds with core principles of healthcare ethics. 

Targeting “members of diverse populations” to lead research, rather than simply the most qualified individuals regardless of their background, is contrary to the pursuit of merit and excellence.

And instrumentalizing healthcare as a tool to “eliminate racism and racial inequities” subordinates the role of medical care to larger ideological goals. Healthcare professionals need to focus on providing the best possible care to patients, not turn their occupation into a vehicle for social justice activism.

As recently as April 2025, Duke Health maintained the pledge on its website; however, the pledge has since been removed.  Its webpage now redirects to a pledge focusing on dignity, compassion, and humanity.

It’s not clear exactly when the change occurred; the James G. Martin Center for Academic Renewal in July praised Duke for removing the pledge.

This is welcome news, of course, and the timing is more than a little interesting: back in March, Do No Harm submitted a federal civil rights complaint against Duke Health for racially discriminatory practices in its admissions and scholarship decisions.

For instance, Duke Health’s diversity plan explicitly called for adapting admissions processes to increase acceptance of underrepresented minority applicants, even pairing prospective minority candidates with current minority students during the admissions process.

What’s more, in late July, Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and Secretary of Education Linda McMahon demanded Duke end its discriminatory practices and implement measures to ensure merit is prioritized.

Here’s hoping that Duke follows through and not only removes all traces of the divisive, discriminatory ideology of DEI from its policies and practices, but commits to focusing on healthcare and healthcare alone.

Do No Harm Report Reveals How the Human Rights Campaign Injects Gender Ideology into Children’s Hospitals

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RICHMOND, VA; August 14, 2025 – Today, Do No Harm released a report exposing how the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) uses its Healthcare Equality Index to infiltrate health systems and push gender ideology on children.

The report, titled “How the Human Rights Campaign’s Healthcare Equality Index Infects Pediatric Hospitals with Gender Ideology,” outlines HRC’s history of peddling gender ideology to kids, analyzes its Healthcare Equality Index (HEI), and reveals how hospitals are pressured to adopt policies and practices that promote harmful sex change interventions on minors.

“It is time to expose and root out the Human Rights Campaign’s vast influence over healthcare systems,” said Kurt Miceli, MD, Medical Director at Do No Harm and co-author of the report. “Our report sheds light on how the HRC weaponized its so-called ‘Healthcare Equality Index’ to pressure pediatric hospitals into providing dangerous, experimental gender transition services for minors. By capitulating to the HRC’s political scheme, hospitals have utterly betrayed patients, especially children struggling with gender dysphoria. If health systems care about providing high-quality pediatric care, then they should distance themselves from the HRC and its Index. Medical professionals must learn the truth about pediatric gender medicine and dare to speak out against the harmful model imposed by the HRC and other ideologues.”

The HEI measures hospitals’ adherence to the tenets of gender ideology by evaluating healthcare facilities’ policies and practices across five criteria. These criteria include requirements such as LGBTQ+ medicine training for executives, offering transgender-specific clinical services, providing coverage for puberty blockers to children, and promoting LGBTQ+ community programs. A score of 100 on the HEI indicates a hospital will proudly perform pediatric medical transitions and will not tolerate dissenting voices.

Key Findings:

  • Forty-one pediatric hospitals were listed in the 2024 HEI.
  • Twenty pediatric hospitals received a “perfect” score of 100 on the HEI.
  • Nine of the HEI-participating hospitals were included in the Dirty Dozen from Do No Harm’s Stop the Harm Database.

The report’s co-authors are Dr. Kurt Miceli, Medical Director at Do No Harm, and Beth Rempe, RN, a nurse member at Do No Harm.

To read the report, click here.

Do No Harm, established in April 2022, has rapidly gained recognition and made significant strides in its mission to safeguard healthcare from ideological threats. With over 30,000 members, including doctors, nurses, physicians, and concerned citizens across all 50 states and 14 countries, DNH has achieved over 10,000 media hits in top-tier publications and garnered widespread attention through numerous broadcast news appearances.

A New Medical School Just Started Up – And It’s Already Knee-Deep in DEI

Roseman University College of Medicine, a Nevada medical school which just opened its doors this year, has wasted no time embracing the DEI ideology that pervades medical education.

As a prime example, take the school’s “ASPIRE” program, a program for students as young as elementary school, that has the “one major goal” to “increase the diversity of the physician workforce by exposing and providing learning opportunities for students traditionally underrepresented in medicine and to educate diverse students to provide comprehensive care to the Southern Nevada community.” 

Details on this initiative are light, as it is still in its infancy, but the “underrepresented” language it employs is commonly used to refer to minority racial groups. 

As the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) maintained on its website (at least until recently), individuals are deemed to be “underrepresented in medicine” if they belong to “those racial and ethnic populations that are underrepresented in the medical profession relative to their numbers in the general population.”

“ASPIRE will engage the families of potential students to ensure the success of the student throughout the journey via quarterly reviews of student material and guidance on how parents and guardians can provide support to their student,” the description of the program continues.

Beyond the ASPIRE program, there’s other evidence of DEI in the school’s initiatives and personnel.

Take this line from the biography of Dr. Cheryl Brewster, the current Senior Executive Dean for Access, Opportunity, and Collaboration at Roseman University of Health Sciences and one of the leaders behind the founding of the College of Medicine:

“Additionally, Dr. Brewster’s work includes providing pathways and programs to specifically increase the number of BIPOC students in medical school.”

Dr. Brewster further affirmed this commitment in a statement contained within the medical school’s strategic plan: “Equity, inclusion and diversity are critical to all our endeavors at Roseman COM.”

In fact, “diversity” is one of the six goals identified in the medical school’s strategic plan.

The plan states that the school will “ensure a diverse, inclusive and equitable environment in which students, faculty and staff realize a sense of belonging.”

To achieve this, the plan recommends several strategies including an effort to “[e]stablish an organizational structure and culture committed to diversity, equity and inclusion across all aspects of teaching, research, service, and practice.”

Roseman University College of Medicine’s early and enthusiastic embrace of DEI is an ill omen for its commitment to championing excellence and merit in medicine.

But there is still time to reverse course and focus on educating the best possible physicians – not the best possible DEI evangelists. 

Medical schools should ensure that students learn to become exceptional physicians by cultivating strong diagnostic acumen, learning clinical skills, and fostering the ability to apply scientific insights to patient care. Learning to provide good quality care that promotes patient safety and wellbeing is a must. The curriculum must teach evidence-based medicine and principles of scientific inquiry, not ideology, and focus on cultivating excellence rather than dogma.

University of Cincinnati Med School Asks Students to Swear an Oath to DEI

As the ethical backbone of the medical profession, the Hippocratic Oath has bound physicians to a commitment to avoid harming patients, to help the sick, and to various other ethical principles.

But the University of Cincinnati (UC) College of Medicine would also like its aspiring medical professionals to take a new oath: one that requires students to commit to combating “disparities,” acknowledging “historical injustices,” and cultivating “inclusion.” 

According to the medical school’s website, students recited this oath, the “Oath of Professionalism” for the graduating Class of 2025, at the school’s Honor’s Day ceremony in May – alongside a variation of the Hippocratic Oath.

The very first line of the Oath of Professionalism affirms the students’ vow to “promote equity, foster trust, and drive innovation in service to others.”

Next, the oath contains a vow to “combat healthcare disparities by confronting our biases, amplifying marginalized voices, and valuing diverse perspectives.”

The oath goes on to ask students to “acknowledge the historical injustices of [the medical] profession while providing care with transparency and cultural humility.”

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Figure 1. A screenshot of the Oath of Professionalism.

Taken together, these commitments subordinate the practice of medicine to the pursuit of, and the adherence to, social justice ideology. 

However, the fact that the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine seems to view the profession of medicine as instrumental to achieving DEI goals is not surprising.

In June 2022, Do No Harm filed a complaint with the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights regarding the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine’s “Underrepresented in Medicine Visiting Clerkship Program,” which conditioned awards on applicants’ racial and ethnic background.

Moreover, the university’s president Neville Pinto expressed subtle dismay at President Trump’s attempts to crack down on DEI in higher education earlier this year.

The University of Cincinnati College of Medicine should dispense with oaths to DEI and instead commit wholeheartedly to the ethical practice of medicine.

Medical School Hosts Presentation Dismissing Adverse Health Consequences of Obesity

It might seem obvious that a medical school should teach students pertinent medical information, not promote ideological programming that downplays genuine health concerns.

The Lewis Katz School of Medicine at Temple University, however, appears to disagree.

This February, the school hosted a presentation that encourages acceptance of obesity and seems to dismiss the serious health risks associated with excess weight.

The presentation, which was offered during the school’s “Doctoring 1” class for first-year medical students, downplays the health risks of obesity and instead paints the focus on such risks as evidence of stigma, bias, and even racism.

First, the presentation appears to endorse the “Weight Inclusive” approach to medical care, including the statement that “Health and well-being are achievable for all regardless of weight.”

It’s hard to believe that this is a genuine claim taught to future physicians at a medical school, but nevertheless it appears in the presentation.

Figure 1. A slide highlighting the “weight inclusive” approach to medical care.

To be clear, excess weight and obesity are strongly correlated with elevated mortality, with severe obesity potentially shortening life expectancy by up to 14 years. In many circumstances, properly selected patients with obesity who lose significant amounts of weight have been shown to live longer, with better quality of life. 

In addition to neglecting the wealth of evidence on the health risks and preventability of obesity, which make it highly irresponsible for a presentation at a medical school, the presentation’s claims are tinged with an ideological flavor.

“This course will make Coca-Cola, Pepsi, and other wealthy corporations very happy. So-called ‘fatphobia’ is ideologically driven science denial, specifically, denial of the adverse population-wide health effects of obesity,” said Kevin Jon Williams, MD, Professor of Cardiovascular Sciences and Professor of Medicine at the Lewis Katz School of Medicine. “We’re not talking about aesthetics, which change from year to year and culture to culture. Obesity makes people sick, shortens lives, and impairs quality of life.”

Several slides invoke concepts such as “social determinants of health” or SDOH and “implicit bias.”

For instance, the presentation dares to ask the question: “What if obesity is another problematic social construct?”

This framing obfuscates the empirical, physiological realities that obese people face, such as elevated mortality. Is heart disease a “social construct” as well?

Moreover, the presentation references social determinants of health (SDOH), which are social, economic, and environmental conditions that associate with individuals’ health. But associations do not prove causality. 

Figure 2. A slide linking so-called “social determinants of health” to health outcomes.

The role that these so-called “determinants” actually play in determining health outcomes is not well supported.

Although SDOH may be correlated with disparities in health outcomes, the evidence that SDOH actually cause poor health outcomes is shoddy and weak, at best.

Much of the scholarship on the topic confuses social and economic conditions that correlate with poor health outcomes with the actual causes of those outcomes, ignoring other factors such as individual agency and health decisions that contribute to health outcomes. For example, despite its financial cost, smoking is more common among poor people and explains “much of the disparity in health outcomes.”

Unlike targeted interventions to improve obesity, high cholesterol, or high blood pressure, targeted interventions to improve SDOH have a poor record. To date, no study has been able to show that the introduction of a full-service supermarket in a so-called “food desert” lowers the body mass index (BMI) of nearby residents. Programs in 19 counties in Texas and Illinois addressed income disparities by establishing a Universal Basic Income (UBI). But recipients of UBI “reported no increase in access to or utilization of health care.” UBI did not lead to lasting “physical or mental health improvements,” and “recipients were four percentage points more likely to report a disability or health problem that limits the work they can do.”

In other words, SDOH have not been shown to “determine” outcomes, as the name implies; the more apt and accurate description would be “Social Associations of Health (SAOH).”

As another example of ideology over science, the presentation on obesity urged medical students in the audience to take an “Implicit Association Test” to evaluate their own biases toward overweight people.

Yet the notion that Implicit Association Tests predict real-world behavior is dubious: these tests fail to meet widely-accepted standards of reliability and validity. A lay summary of the problems with Implicit Association Tests can be found here. 

Moreover, a 2013 meta-analysis published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology found that Implicit Association Tests were “poor predictors” of real-world bias and discrimination.

Figures 3. A screenshot of the commonly-used Implicit Association Test.

In another slide, the presentation on obesity recommends that the future physicians read two articles, including one titled “The Racist Roots of Fighting Obesity.”

Figure 4. A slide featuring links to two articles arguing that racism and fatphobia are connected.

That latter article argues, among other things, that many health concerns typically associated with obesity are in fact attributable to weight stigma – which, in the case of black women, is racially charged.

The presentation links “anti-fat attitudes” to racism, slavery, and the “Anglo-Saxon Protestant faith,” arguing that “fatphobia” is a “direct consequence of the attempt to rule over Black bodies.” The notion that “fatphobia” is a consequence of the slave trade, while slavery itself is a practice that has occurred across various ethnic groups and nations since the dawn of humanity, is dubious to say the least. Moreover, singling out an ethnicity and a branch of Christianity for this harsh criticism is historically inaccurate, possibly biased, and may engender ethnic and religious biases in these students. 

Figure 5. A slide arguing that “anti-fat attitudes” are linked to racism and slavery.

Of course, it’s unclear how, exactly, these claims alter the reality that obesity poses health risks. And it’s exactly this reality that needs to be taught to medical students so that they can better care for their patients.

The presentation concludes with slides urging students to adopt weight-inclusive practices going forward, including a suggestion that they do not “blame” patients for their weight-related condition.

While physicians should not be cruel to their patients or belittle them, they likewise should not rob patients of their agency or their ability to change their health outcomes through personal choice. Avoiding highly-processed foods, for instance, is just one example. Yet the slides encourage “Increasing nutrient dense foods”. 

Simply put, this presentation is full of claims that are politically charged and irrelevant to the practice of medicine at best, and inaccurate and dangerous at worst. It also plays into the hands of wealthy junk food, beverage, and agricultural interests that push harmful highly processed energy-dense foods and drink.

“The anti-science ideology of ‘fatphobia’ seeks to deny our patients the benefits of lifestyle improvements, medicines, and surgery to improve their lives and quality of life,” said Dr. Williams. “It is damaging and wrong.”

The Lewis Katz School of Medicine should not seek to inculcate its students in ideologies that promote harmful, misleading claims.

Medical Schools Still Discriminate Based on Race, Records Show

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It’s been two years since the Supreme Court banned racial discrimination in college admissions. Nonetheless, at medical schools, evidence suggests that the discrimination continues.

That’s my conclusion after submitting Freedom of Information Act requests to all 93 public medical schools. I asked for several years of admissions data, including on students who matriculated in 2024, following the Supreme Court’s ruling against affirmative action in Students for Fair Admission v. Harvard. I sought data on race, undergraduate grades, MCAT scores, and admission status, in order to assess whether racial disparities in admission standards persisted after the decision.

Twenty-three medical schools have answered my request, including flagship institutions in states like Tennessee, Wisconsin, Missouri, New Mexico, and Colorado. The data they provided make it clear that schools are at least skirting the Supreme Court’s decision, if not violating it outright.

Read the full article at City Journal.