Students and faculty filled the Levinson auditorium on Feb. 6 to attend a conversation with Admiral Rachel L. Levine on LGBTQI+ health and gender-affirming care.
Levine is the assistant secretary for health for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the first transgender woman to hold the position. She has served as a physician in pediatrics and adolescent medicine, as Pennsylvania’s Physician General and as Pennsylvania’s Secretary of Health.
During the event, Levine discussed the legal and societal barriers to gender-affirming care, including the role physicians play in advocacy and addressing misinformation. Among those in attendance were Yale students from the Law School, School of Medicine and School of Public Health, alongside other Yale faculty and community members.
“I firmly believe that none of us make progress unless we all make progress,” Levine said. “Reducing disparities in LGBTQI+ communities must take intentional account of systemic racism and implicit bias in the intersectionality of health disparities.”