5/10/13

Blue Cross Anthem Now Covers Sexual Reassignment Surgery


Not sure if I'm the last to know about this but it's news to me. Since my company switched to a new unaffordable insurance plan that does not cover HRT all options are on the table. Why not try and upgrade if we can? Judging by the phrase "one option for extreme cases" it would appear Blue Cross has preempted the generally accepted diagnosis and will put the onus on the patient to prove their gender dysphoria is 'extreme' enough to warrant SRS. (jumping through cisnormative binary hoops)

Reading the Clinical UM Guideline it becomes apparent the devil is in the details so read it carefully and be fully aware of your options. But most importantly, since you are dealing with a commercial enterprise intent on giving you the least for your money, be beware.




5/9/13

Virtual Criminal Flash Mob Stole 45 Million From ATM's Worldwide in a Few Hours

In what may be the crime of the century cells of people called 'cashiers' used prepaid cards with limits removed to empty ATMs around the world in just hours of more than 45 million dollars.

The good news is that the stolen money did not belong to individual accounts so no one who has a prepaid card has to worry. It was stolen from two middle Eastern banks, Rakbank and Muscat Bank, both banks racked in millions in net profit in 2012. The demographic that uses prepaid bank cards, poor people,  includes trans folk who suffer incredible job discrimination.

Here's how it worked according to the associated press:

"Hackers got into bank databases, eliminated withdrawal limits on pre-paid debit cards and created access codes. Others loaded that data onto any plastic card with a magnetic stripe — an old hotel key card or an expired credit card worked fine as long as it carried the account data and correct access codes."

Source USA Today "After penetrating the processor's computer network, the hackers fraudulently manipulated the balances and withdrawal limits on Rakbank prepaid debit card accounts. Then, teams of so-called cashers allegedly launched carefully timed attacks that caused more than $5 million in criminal losses from more than 4,500 ATMs in about 20 countries."

"In just two hours and 25 minutes, the thieves allegedly conducted 750 fraudulent transactions that withdrew nearly $400,000 from approximately 140 New York City ATM locations, according to prosecutors and the indictment."

"The alleged second unlimited operation unfolded between the afternoon of Feb. 19 and the pre-dawn hours of the following day. This time, the gang's hackers allegedly compromised computers of the processor of prepaid debit cards for the Bank of Muscat, located in Oman."

"In approximately 10 hours, casher cells in 24 countries conducted approximately 36,000 ATM transactions worldwide, withdrawing an estimated $40 million, the indictment charged. The haul included $2.4 million withdrawn by the alleged New York crew."


Modern day Robin Hoods? Not. But at least they didn't steal from the poor. They stole from the filthy rich.

变性能见度开始与“兄弟”Chinese Transman Visibility begins with the "Brothers" Documentary

In 2012 a competition was held for fledgling Chinese directors who aspired to make documentaries about LGBT topics. Out of dozens of applicants two projects were chosen. One project about transmen was picked up because the subject has received so little attention. Chinese transgender men share a peculiar blessing universally with all queer comrades worldwide. Many meld seamlessly into society which is why so little is known of their lives, joys and struggles. We see transmen day to day like vague distorted images seen through a moving vehicle's window.

Yaoyao, one of the winners runs a photo studio for lesbians in Shandong province '... works in an organisation with quite a few transgender people and she already has the permission of one of them to film the whole process [from female to male],’ Stijn Deklerck of Queer Comrades told
Gay Star News in 2012 . ‘And that's a story that hasn't really been covered in China. There have been quite a few documentaries and films about male-to-female transgenders, but there's not been very much on female-to-male.

That's about to change. The Netherlands Embassy in Beijing, Queer Comrades, the Aibai Culture & Education Center, the Beijing Gender Health Education Institute and Common Language are holding an event in connection with the International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia (IDAHO) on Friday 17 May, 14.00 – 17.00 pm.



The event is hosted by and will take place at the Netherlands Embassy in Beijing. It will consist of the premiere of the documentary “Brothers” produced by the LGBT organization Queer Comrades (you can watch the trailer here), a panel discussion including Yaoyao (director of thedocumentary), Tony (transgender man, documentary main character), Joanne Leung (founder Transgender Resource Center Hong Kong), Zhen Hongli (psychologist Global Care Women & Children’s Hospital Beijing), and Guo Yanan (Aibai Transgender Program Assistant). This will be followed by an informal networking event where you are encouraged to get to know the Beijing LGBT organizations and their work on transgender issues. The documentary will be provided with Chinese -English subtitles, the panel discussion will take place in the Chinese language without translation.

As seating is limited, please confirm your attendance by writing an email to IDAHO2013@163.COM. We will give priority seating to members of the media, educational professionals and psychological counselors, so please specify your affiliation in this regard.

Address: Netherlands Embassy in Beijing, Liangmahe South Road #4, Chaoyang, Beijing

Tel. : (+86 10) 8532 0200

event information

5/8/13

National Institute of Mental Health Rocks the Mental Health World by Abandoning The DSM

Just weeks before the release of the DSM-5 National Institute of Mental Health Abandoning The DSM has they will be "Transforming Diagnosis" by initiating a completely separate system of Diagnosis.
It became immediately clear that we cannot design a system based on biomarkers or cognitive performance because we lack the data. In this sense, RDoC is a framework for collecting the data needed for a new nosology. But it is critical to realize that we cannot succeed if we use DSM categories as the “gold standard.

That is why NIMH will be re-orienting its research away from DSM categories. Going forward, we will be supporting research projects that look across current categories – or sub-divide current categories – to begin to develop a better system”

The NIMH understands this is an immense expensive proposition, one that will be fought by entrenched bureaucrates, but desperately needed as the diagnosis of transgender people by the APA has become disassociated with reality.

RDoC, for now, is a research framework, not a clinical tool. This is a decade-long project that is just beginning. Many NIMH researchers, already stressed by budget cuts and tough competition for research funding, will not welcome this change. Some will see RDoC as an academic exercise divorced from clinical practice. But patients and families should welcome this change as a first step towards "precision medicine,” the movement that has transformed cancer diagnosis and treatment. RDoC is nothing less than a plan to transform clinical practice by bringing a new generation of research to inform how we diagnose and treat mental disorders. As two eminent psychiatric geneticists recently concluded, “At the end of the 19th century, it was logical to use a simple diagnostic approach that offered reasonable prognostic validity. At the beginning of the 21st century, we must set our sights higher.”3

Read more at the National Institute of Mental Health Abandoning The DSM




ABC News Producer's Transition reveals the True Dawn

ABC News producer D. Ennis was to coworkers and friends just a very affordable and able person. The kind of person you want to share a beer with at joe's bar at the end of a day. By all outward appearances and old facebook profile pictures that what Ennis was. But much of that changed with the beginning of the new day.

As affable as Ennis was what people saw when the sun rose and a new workday began, to some extent, was a false false dawn. Ennis was keeping a secret from the world.

Dawn told the world about her coming out in a life event on facebook:

Today I begin anew. I arrived at work tonight in my LBD (little black dress, for you guys) and found on my desk a beautiful bouquet of flowers from my coworkers and a touching ...note from the president of the news division of ABC (I myself brought the cake -- and the glitter -- to thank my very accepting colleagues).

Please understand: this is not a game of dress-up, or make-believe... it is my affirmation of who I now am and what I must do to be happy, in response to a soul-crushing secret that my wife and I have been dealing with for more than seven years, mostly in secret.

I have a rare medical condition -- nothing deadly or infectious -- but it has resulted in an unusual hormonal imbalance, one so profound that I don't resemble the man you first met ten years ago. It's wrecked our marriage and changed me, both physically and in my personality; even my own way of thinking has been altered.

What I have done is to try to put together a life based on my new experience. I have spent years fighting this, trying through dozens of tests and sheer willpower to overcome what doctors cannot cure nor reverse, or even satisfactorily explain.

My beloved wife and I are separating after nearly 17 years of marriage because of this change in me; despite the heartbreak, she has encouraged me to start this new life that we both believe better fits who I now am. It's not something I've longed for or dreamed of, or discovered in my youth. It's not even something, frankly, that I wanted to do -- but I've realized, I needed to do it.

I am transgender, and identify as female. My legal name is now Dawn Stacey Ennis, and my government records now reflect that my gender is female. However, I have not had surgery of any kind, and the HRT I now take is merely to maintain a balance in what is already, mysteriously a more female than male body.

My bosses at ABC have been supportive beyond my hopes and encouraged me to be real, to be who I feel I am. Trust me, this is NOT the midlife crisis I was counting on -- I'd much prefer to have bought a sportscar. Even an affair, I think, would have been something we might have recovered from. But Wendy and I realize that with this, there is no going forward for us, and that is without doubt the saddest aspect of this change for me.

As you may know,we have three children and we are putting them first. I am moving out Saturday, to give my wife and our kids time and space to adjust to life with me on the outside. It's not what I want, but we agreed it's what she can handle. It's a small sacrifice to try to avoid ruining the end of their school year.

I know this is a lot to throw at you out of the blue, and I'm sure if you had to pick someone we know in common who might be transitioning from male to female, I'm guessing I would not even crack the top ten. But it's my reality. I hope you can understand.

I look forward to hopefully keeping you as my friend, and respect your choice to block or defriend me if that's how you feel. If you have questions, please don't hesitate to ask. Being a journalist, I've asked them all, and will share what I know.

Warmly,
Dawn



5/7/13

Department of Justice: Create a National Task Force to address the serial Killings of Black Trans Women

Three transgender woman of color have been murdered in April alone. "Enough is enough" says Sharon Lettman-Hicks, Executive Director and CEO of the National Black Justice Coalition (NBJC) in a joint press release with The National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs:
The National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs (NCAVP) is deeply concerned of three unsolved homicides of transgender women of color that occurred during the month of April in 2013, which continues a trend of murders of transgender and gender non-conforming women and people of color in the past few years. On Wednesday, April 3rd, Kelly Young, a 29-year-old black transgender woman, was found shot to death inside a home in Baltimore, Maryland. Then on Thursday, April 4th, 30-year-old Ashley Sinclair, a black transgender woman, was found shot to death in a wooded area in the Oak Ridge section of Orange County, Florida. And on April 30, another young black transgender woman, Cemia Dove, also known as Ci Ci was found on April 17 in a retention pond in Olmsted Township, Ohio. Dove, a 20-year-old woman, had multiple stab wounds, was tied to a concrete block, and was found naked from the waist down. As of April 30th, all three of these homicides remain unsolved.

At issue is also the media's horrific reporting of Ce ce Dove in Ohio and there dismissive attitude to local LGBT groups concerns:
The Buckeye Region Anti-Violence Organization (BRAVO), an NCAVP member organization that works to end LGBTQ-related violence and homicide, has issued a press release about Dove’s murder, but media failed to pick up the story. “BRAVO is saddened to learn of the most recent hate crime murder, and outraged at the media’s flagrant disregard for human dignity,” said Gloria McCauley, Executive Director of BRAVO, “Every homicide deserves to be investigated and all possible leads followed so that we can understand what the cause of the homicide was. This is particularly true when the homicide involves a community that we know is at a higher risk of bias-related homicides such as transgender women of color.”

Three unsolved homicides within one month should elicit a national outcry," said Sharon Lettman-Hicks, Executive Director and CEO at NBJC. "We need to hold our law enforcement officials accountable at every level--from local police departments that need to work tirelessly to find these killers and bring them to justice, to federal agencies such as the Department of Justice that should create a national task force to address the serial killings of Black trans women in this nation. How many more lives must be lost before we take serious action to stop this madness?"

H/T Pink News