Congratulations to Daisy Devine on a very well written article (“Banning gender-affirming care leads to suffering,” published April 14) and to the Courier-Herald for putting it on your opinion page. State legislators deciding who can receive medical care and what medical care is a terrible idea.

You wouldn’t go to a veterinarian to work on your teeth and you wouldn’t go to a lawyer to get cancer treatment! What young people, and adults for that matter, need is medical and emotional support. Major medical associations agree these policies and laws are bad policies. Transgender folks already struggles with hate crimes against them, murder, and prejudice; denying them access to medical and emotional care will lead to more suffering and possibly suicide.

Legislators are not qualified to make medical and psychological decisions for a specific group of Americans. I hope Daisy is right. Hope and love can solve this.

Ellen Koehn

Enumclaw