Soe v. Louisiana State Board of Medical Examiners

Lambda Legal, the Harvard Law School Center for Health Law and Policy Innovation (CHLPI) and Louisiana co-counsel filed this case in Orleans Civil District Court before it was transferred to the 19th Judicial District Court in East Baton Rouge Parish, on behalf of five transgender Louisiana youth and their families. The lawsuit challenges Act 466 (the “Health Care Ban”), a state law that took effect January 1, 2024, which prohibits the provision of necessary gender-affirming medical care for minors who are transgender and punishes health care providers for providing such care in Louisiana.  

The Health Care Ban is already causing serious harm. Four of the plaintiff minors were already receiving gender-affirming care prescribed by their doctors when the ban took effect; the fifth, Susie Soe, has been blocked from accessing care her doctors recommend, and her parents have sought for her. Families unable to leave Louisiana are watching their children suffer while the care their doctors recommend is unlawfully withheld. The same treatments the ban prohibits for transgender youth remain available to non-transgender patients for other purposes. We argue the Health Care Ban violates the Louisiana Constitution on three grounds: it strips parents of their fundamental right to direct their children’s medical care; it interferes with minors’ right to obtain medical treatment recommended by their doctors; and it discriminates on the basis of sex and transgender status by singling out transgender youth for mistreatment no other minors face. 

We are asking the court to declare Act 466 unconstitutional and permanently block its enforcement. In January 2026, the court denied the state’s motion for summary judgment, allowing the case to proceed to trial.