Childhood Transgender Treatments Create ‘Life-Long’ Patients: Alabama Doctor

Alabama plastic surgeon Patrick Lappert, who addressed Alabama General Assembly on effects of transitional gender treatment on minors, at his practice, Lappert Skin Care, on April 13, 2022. Courtesy of Patrick Lappert

Amid a groundswell of debate over the rationality of minors receiving medical treatment to change their genders, one Alabama physician is speaking about the long-term effects of pharmaceutical and surgical alterations and how they can make a child “a life-long patient.”

Patrick Lappert, a plastic surgeon with Lappert Skin Care in Alabama, spoke in favor of state Senate Bill 184 in Senate and House committees. The bill makes it a felony for doctors to treat minors—defined in Alabama state law as any person under the age of 19—with pharmaceutical and surgical transgender procedures, and carries a sentence of up to 10 years in prison.