Federal panel rules that private Medicare plan must cover Texas trans veteran’s reassignment...

U.S. government panel has ruled that a privately run Medicare plan must cover sex reassignment surgery for a Texas transgender woman, a decision her attorney said was the first of its kind.

Charlene Lauderdale, a U.S. Air Force veteran, first sought surgery through her UnitedHealthcare/AARP Medicare Complete insurance plan in November 2014. The federally funded plan, operated by a unit of UnitedHealth Group Inc, denied the request.

An administrative law judge with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services ruled last April that the plan must cover the surgery, and the agency’s Medicare Appeals Council upheld that decision this month.

Lauderdale’s lawyer, Ezra Young, said he received the council’s decision on Thursday.

“I am so relieved that I can now get the medical care that I have needed for so long,” Lauderdale, 55, said in a press release. “I hope that my decision will help other transgender Americans who have also been denied health care.”