Between 2020-2024, 30 states passed discriminatory laws that adversely target socially marginalized groups, including Black people and other people of color; lesbian, gay, bisexual, and queer people; transgender and nonbinary people; and women and other birthing people, according to a new analysis. These findings underscore the need for a coordinated response by policymakers, health advocates, clinicians, researchers, and more to restore and preserve protections for marginalized populations. In recent years, the United States has experienced an unprecedented surge in state laws that limit access to critical services and resources, including gender-affirming care, abortion care, gender-congruent bathrooms, and critical race theory education in school.
In many states, multiple discriminatory laws simultaneously threaten the health of populations that are already socially marginalized, according to a new analysis by Boston University School of Public Health (BUSPH), Cornell Law School (CLS), and the University of Delaware (UD). Published in the American Journal of Public Health , the analytic essay assessed state legislation across the nation and found that between January 2020 and January 2024, 30 states enacted laws that adversely target Black people and other people of color , lesbian, gay, bisexual, and queer people (LGBQ) people, transgender people , and/or birthing people. Moreover, 25 of these states passed laws that target more than one of these groups.
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