PRACTITIONER BLOG
Read our analyses of developments in Impact Litigation and stay current on class action law
Watching a Juris Doctor Save Lives: Partnering with Lambda Legal to Fight for Healthcare for All
Together with Lambda Legal and Walt Auvil of the Employment Law Center in West Virginia, my firm Nichols Kaster filed suit against West Virginia Medicaid on behalf our clients Christopher Fain and Shauntae Anderson. In that case, Fain v. Crouch, we challenged the state Medicaid program’s categorical exclusion of gender affirming surgical care under the Equal Protection Clause, the Affordable Care Act, and the Medicaid Act.
West Virginia Can No Longer Discriminate Against Transgender Medicaid Participants
On August 2, 2022, federal District Court Judge Robert C. Chambers granted affirmative summary judgment for Plaintiffs in Fain et al. v. Crouch et. al, and ruled that West Virginia could no longer discriminate against transgender Medicaid participants by excluding coverage for gender-confirming surgical care. In their complaint, Plaintiffs alleged that West Virginia state health insurance plans deprive transgender people of essential, and sometimes life-saving, health care.