Biden Top Trans Health Official Rachel Levine Touts ‘Gender-Affirming Care’ as ‘Mental Health Care’, ‘Suicide Prevention Care’

The Biden administration’s transgender assistant secretary for health celebrated ‘pride month’ in a new video in which the official expanded the LGBTQ cult’s celebration into a “summer of pride” while promoting “gender-affirming care” for children and teens, calling it “mental health care” and “suicide prevention care.”

This first of a series of ‘pride’ videos, published last week at the Department of Health and Human Services’ (HHS) YouTube site, features Admiral Rachel (born Richard) Levine having a discussion with transgender singer, songwriter, and activist Ryan Cassata, 29, a woman who identifies as a male and admitted to having top surgery, i.e., an elective double mastectomy to remove her healthy breasts, at age 18 in order to appear more like a male.

“My name is Ryan Cassata,” the activist said. “I use he/him pronouns and I like to share my pronouns first before I start any conversation.”

Cassata’s music is mostly “protest songs to help the transgender liberation movement”:

I started my activism when I was 13 years old after getting bullied pretty severely in middle school when I first came out. And from there on, I joined the Safe Schools team through the LGBT network on Long Island where I grew up. And that is where I learned to publicly speak and also learned the education that I needed to be able to go into schools and conferences to carry the message.

Cassata appears to have learned the essential narratives of the trans agenda, including that measures to protect children and teens from life-altering transgender interventions, drugs, and surgeries are dubbed “anti-trans legislation”:

As a trans man, I know that my body is politicized. My identity is politicized right now, especially with all of the anti-trans legislation and bills that are happening right now in our community and our country. And it just naturally flows because the thing that I am most passionate about is helping the transgender community to freedom, really, and that comes through often in my music.

“Well, that's fantastic,” Levine responded, and then touted the White House’s ‘pride’ celebration.

“[T]he president and the first lady spoke so eloquently about their support for the broader LGBTQI plus community, but particularly for the transgender community, trans youth, their families, their providers,” the HHS official said, inviting Cassata to speak further about the “challenges” faced by transgender youth “in many states across the country for political purposes.”

“I know I hear it from trans youth every single day, multiple people that they are struggling because of the legislation, because of the media, the news, and we need to do everything we can right now so that trans youth can access the care that they need and they deserve,” Cassata pleaded. “I know that this is life-saving care.”

Levine agreed stating that the LGBTQ community needs “gender-affirming care,” which the HHS assistant secretary described as a term “our opponents have weaponized.”

Cassata then elaborated on how she had to wait until she was 18 to have her “top surgery,” which she described as “life-saving care,” and that waiting that long was difficult because she believed she needed to have her healthy breasts removed in order to live:

I'm 29 years old now. And when I was 14 years old, I knew that I needed top surgery in order to continue living really. I was extremely depressed. My mental health was suffering extreme. And I had to wait until I was 18 to get my surgery. And I was still a teenager when I got my, my top surgery, which is now a very long time ago, and I have not had one single regret. And that surgery, it saved my life. On the other side of that surgery, I had a lot more confidence. And just even in my posture, you could see it, and I was smiling more. And the people around me noticed a change as well. Life got brighter and more hopeful for me after that surgery so that saved my life.

“I could barely wait until I was 18 to get my life-saving surgery,” Cassata added after being prompted further by Levine. “I can't imagine waiting at all. For most people waiting is not a possibility. And that is really a threat to someone's life.”

“You know, we often say that gender-affirming care is health care,” Levine responded. “Gender-affirming care is mental health care, and gender affirming care is literally suicide prevention care.”

“I 100 percent agree,” Cassata replied. “I know statistically speaking that the regret rate for gender affirming surgery is about 1 percent, and that is significantly lower than the regret rate for general surgery like a knee replacement. And that is, that is something that needs to be part of the conversation because the regret rate is so, so low.”

Levine is always careful to state that the higher rates of mental illness in LGBTQ young people are caused by bullying, discrimination, and abuse by non-gender-affirming people.

“[W]e know that the youth, LGBTQI+ youth and trans youth, have higher rates of depression and anxiety,” the HHS official said. “But it's really important to emphasize that there's nothing inherent with being on the rainbow that would predispose someone to those mental health challenges. It is the bullying that you're talking about, the harassment and discrimination that the youth and adults face, which leads to those mental health challenges.”

Below is the official trailer of Affirmation Generation: The Lies of Transgender Medicine, a documentary which premiered in September 2022 and features the stories of six young detransitioners (three men and three women), who sought medical intervention but, instead, were irreversibly harmed by "gender-affirming care."

Levine further promoted the transgender medical industry:

I think that, you know, studies show that youth that have access to evidence-based gender-affirming care, who have the support of their families and their community, have actually excellent mental health outcomes. And much of this gender affirming care is being, being done by our outstanding children's hospitals throughout the country.

Listen to Do No Harm Senior Fellow Dr. Miriam Grossman, a child, adolescent, and adult psychiatrist, as she testified before the House Committee on Energy and Commerce two weeks ago.

Grossman rebuked the LGBTQ narrative that Levine touts, namely, that “gender-affirming care” is “literally suicide prevention care,” by observing that “a growing number of countries have effectively banned” gender-affirming care.

“And, thank God, there's been no wave of suicides or other mental health catastrophes,” she noted, adding that, regarding the narrative that gender-affirming care prevents suicide, Finland gender expert Dr. Riittakerttu Kaltiala asserted, “It’s purposeful disinformation, the spreading of which is irresponsible.”

Grossman reported that seven nations, as well as the U.S. state of Florida, have now concluded that “kids don't need their development interrupted.”

“The girls don't need their periods stopped and their voices lowered and the boys don't need to grow breasts,” she stated. “What they need is psychotherapy.”