{"id":2644518,"date":"2026-08-13T16:12:01","date_gmt":"2026-08-13T20:12:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/utm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaignvance-orders-fraud-probe-into-doctors-for-concealing-trans-surgeries-should-go-to-prison\/"},"modified":"2026-08-13T16:20:51","modified_gmt":"2026-08-13T20:20:51","slug":"utm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaignvance-orders-fraud-probe-into-doctors-for-concealing-trans-surgeries-should-go-to-prison","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/utm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaignvance-orders-fraud-probe-into-doctors-for-concealing-trans-surgeries-should-go-to-prison\/","title":{"rendered":"Vance Orders Fraud Probe Into Docs For Hiding Trans Surgeries"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">20<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Futm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaignvance-orders-fraud-probe-into-doctors-for-concealing-trans-surgeries-should-go-to-prison%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=2644518&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>Vice president J.D. Vance has instructed the Department of Justice to investigate health care providers accused of falsifying billing codes to bill insurance companies for transgender medical procedures performed on children. This move follows a report by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) suggesting that some doctors and hospitals may have committed health care fraud by using misleading codes to collect payments for procedures like surgeries, hormone treatments, and puberty blockers, totaling approximately $120 million sence 2019. The report highlights how clinics have exploited diagnostic codes-such as &#8220;endocrine disorder, unspecified&#8221; and &#8220;precocious puberty&#8221;-to bill for treatments that are often not medically appropriate for the patients&#8217; age or condition, generating important revenue and sometimes billing for treatments not needed or misdiagnosed. <\/p>\n<p>The investigation aims to hold accountable those who deliberately miscode treatments to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/trump-admin-puts-hundreds-of-hospitals-on-notice-fix-this-or-face-millions-in-fines\/\" title=\"Trump Admin Puts Hundreds of ... on Notice: Fix This or Face Millions in Fines\">secure insurance coverage<\/a> and profit from these procedures, which some argue are performed with minimal psychological evaluation and oversight. The report also criticizes how financial incentives have contributed to the expansion of pediatric transgender clinics, emphasizing the potential long-term health costs for patients, which can reach up to $170,000. First-hand accounts within the report describe concerns about rushed processes, inadequate safeguards, parental pressure, and the lack of support for patients seeking to detransition. Critics argue that the profit-driven medical industry, political pressures, and regulatory failures have contributed to the rapid and possibly harmful medicalization of gender-affirming procedures in children.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"readmore\">\n    <button onclick=\"showReadMore()\" id=\"readmorebtn\">Read more&#8230;<\/button>\n<\/p>\n<hr id=\"line\">\n<span id=\"more\"><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Vice President J.D. Vance is directing the Department of Justice to launch a federal criminal investigation into health care providers falsifying billing codes to get insurance to cover the cost of \u201ctransgender\u201d medical interventions for children, saying those found guilty \u201cshould go to prison.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Vance\u2019s Justice Department referral came shortly after the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) released a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hhs.gov\/sites\/default\/files\/hhs-wolves-in-white-coats.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">report<\/a> detailing profit incentives for predator doctors to convince children they are a different sex, creating a lifelong paying \u201ccaptive patient.\u201d The document  \u201cmay have been defrauding Medicaid and private insurers by using misleading or fraudulent billing codes to get insurance to cover the costs,\u201d Vance said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cToday I am referring the HHS report and the allegations it contains to the Department of Justice to determine whether the providers identified have <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/federal-judge-in-texas-stops-biden-deportation-freeze\/\" title=\"Federal judge in Texas stops Biden deportation freeze\">violated federal law<\/a>, regulations, or policies \u2026 and federal fraud and conspiracy laws,\u201d Vance wrote in a <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/JDVance\/status\/2087939911747834289?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">letter<\/a> to Attorney General Todd Blanche. \u201cWhen providers miscode treatments in order to secure insurance coverage for gender-transitioning interventions that insurance would not otherwise cover, they should be held accountable. If they have done so intentionally, thereby perpetrating fraud on Medicaid or on private insurers, they should go to prison.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>According to the HHS report, doctors and hospitals have filed roughly $120 million in insurance claims related to child \u201ctransgender\u201d medical procedures since 2019, noting that more than 225 hospitals and health systems set up pediatric transgender clinics from 2015 to 2025. The report alleges the revenue resulted from \u201cover 5,500 surgical procedures and 8,500 courses\u201d of opposite-sex hormones or puberty blockers.<\/p>\n<p>The report says those clinics \u201cused misleading or potentially fraudulent diagnostic and procedural codes\u201d to obtain insurance payments for the interventions, which include mastectomies and vaginoplasties. For example, there was a 30 percent increase in billing for \u201cendocrine disorder, unspecified\u201d from 2020 to 2022, while fewer than 5 percent of patients with that code really had endocrine disorders.<\/p>\n<p>Nonetheless, over the past 10 years, doctors used this generic code to give puberty blockers to hundreds of children ages 9-17 who should have been coded as having gender dysphoria, raking in $42.6 million, according to the report. The majority of the claims were paid by insurance companies, but about $7.8 million was paid by Medicaid.<\/p>\n<p>Another code used, the report said, was \u201cprecocious puberty,\u201d which is a rare condition where puberty begins too early \u2014 it is typically diagnosed before age 8 for girls and 9 for boys. In those instances, puberty blockers are administered to delay puberty temporarily so it can take its course at a normal age. They are usually stopped at age 10 or 11.<\/p>\n<p>However, at Children\u2019s Hospital of Philadelphia, for example, roughly 250 children were diagnosed with the condition at ages 10 and above, including \u201cnumerous teenagers 14 to 18. \u2026 well beyond the age\u201d of typical diagnosis, the report said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis miscoding has allowed hospitals to bill insurance companies tens of millions of dollars for medication like puberty-blocking drugs,\u201d Vance said. <\/p>\n<p>As the report noted, pediatrics is the \u201clowest-paid medical specialty\u201d and pediatric departments usually have lower profit margins \u201cand thus presumably wield less influence\u201d relative to other specialty areas. \u201cGender clinics changed that calculus by introducing a novel source of revenue: they promised a new stream of continuous revenue for pediatrics, endocrinology, and surgical specialties by taking physiologically healthy young people \u2014 who otherwise would not need to seek medical attention, and rendering them dependent for life on the medical system.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>For transgender-related interventions alone, lifetime health care cost totals for patients who start to \u201ctransition\u201d as children can be up to $75,000 \u201ceven without surgeries.\u201d With surgeries, it can skyrocket to $170,000 per patient. Even that is before separate therapies like \u201cfertility preservation (egg or sperm banking), voice therapy, hair removal,\u201d or even attempts at reversal through detransitioning.<\/p>\n<p>The report included eight first-hand accounts from parents and children who reported weak or nonexistent clinical safeguards, rushed processes to get patients into medical interventions as quickly as possible, very little psychological examination, parents pressured into trans medicalization, and patients being left out to dry when attempting to detransition.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhen a child is in distress, many parents will go to any length to find help and to relieve the pain. These parents count on America\u2019s pediatric hospitals, medical associations, and federal regulatory agencies to value science over ideology and people over profit when recommending medical procedures,\u201d the report stated. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cInstead, parents encountered wolves in white lab coats who pushed vulnerable children down a path towards irreversible harm from sex-rejecting procedures. Financial incentives from the medical industry and lobby; political and ideological pressures; and failure of oversight at the local, state, and federal levels have all contributed to the rapid medicalization of these procedures and resulted in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/biden-admin-prepares-for-covid-19-shots-for-5-11-year-olds\/\" title=\"Biden Admin Prepares For COVID...19 Shots For 5...11 Year Olds\">long-term physical<\/a> and psychological consequences for many patients.\u201d<\/p>\n<hr>\n<p>      Breccan F. Thies is the White House correspondent for The Federalist. He is a co-recipient of the 2025 Dao Prize for Excellence in Investigative Journalism. As an investigative journalist, he previously covered education and culture issues for the Washington Examiner and Breitbart News. He holds a degree from the University of Virginia and is a 2022 Claremont Institute Publius Fellow. You can follow him on X: @BreccanFThies.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Vance orders probe into billing fraud for child transgender care<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":179,"featured_media":2644519,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/IMG_0119.jpeg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[42812,81059,33227,15469],"class_list":["post-2644518","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-fraud-investigation","tag-medical-transparency","tag-transgender-surgeries","tag-vance"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/IMG_0119.jpeg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2644518","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/179"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2644518"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2644518\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2644530,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2644518\/revisions\/2644530"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2644519"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2644518"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2644518"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2644518"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}