Quentin L. Van Meter

Quentin L. Van Meter (born September 13, 1947) is a pediatric endocrinologist and president of the American College of Pediatricians, a socially conservative advocacy group which is known for opposing gay marriage, gender reassignment surgery, and abortion. He has advocated and referred his clients to conversion therapy and is known for promoting bans on youth transgender health care which are opposed by most medical organizations.

History and advocacy

Van Meter cancelled his 37-year membership of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) in protest of its inclusive stance regarding LGBT people. Van Meter has stated the American College of Pediatricians (ACPeds) was formed when the AAP established a position that gay couples could raise children without adverse effects on their well-being.

In November 2017, Van Meter spoke at an anti-LGBT conference organized by the Texas chapter of MassResistance. He gave a presentation titled "Teens for Truth Conference: Countering the LGBT Agenda" hosted at the Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Texas.

In November 2019 in Georgia, Meter supported an Atlanta bill by Ginny Ehrhart which would make it a felony to provide hormone treatments or gender affirmation surgery on minors. The SPLC stated "Not only does it contradict the overwhelming medical consensus on treating gender dysphoria by professional medical organizations such as the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Medical Association, among many others, but it also puts children at risk of irreparable harm."

In February 2020, Van Meter was presented as an expert witness in the case of a Texas divorce case where the couple's child was undergoing gender-affirming care which one parent wanted to end and the other wanted to continue. The judge ruled that Van Meter was "discredited as an expert" and could not offer expert testimony on "the legal question of whether an adolescent transgender child should be administered puberty blockers and whether affirmation of an incongruent gender in a child is harmful or not." That month he also testified for HB29 in Utah which would prohibit clinicians, doctors, and surgeons from providing gender affirming surgeries or providing hormone therapy to transgender minors.

In April 2021 Meter supported the Arkansas "Save Adolescents from Experimentation act", which probitited doctors providing transgender healthcare to minors or referring them to services that could offer it. The bill also bars insurance from covering minors transition related healthcare and says they're not required to cover it for adults. The American Academy of Pediatrics opposed the bill.

In March 2022, Meter testified in favor of an Idaho Bill which would criminalize doctors providing gender affirming healthcare to minors.

In October 2022, Van Meter served as an expert for Florida in a bill that prevents Medicaid from covering transgender healthcare for low-income adults and minors. In his assessment, he stated the rise in transgender children seeking care was due to "online recruiting and grooming of vulnerable children and adolescents by a generously funded political movement aimed at dissolving the reality and birthright of biologic sex." Medical organizations state that at least some of the increase is due to better understanding and acknowledgement of gender dysphoria. The authors of the state report failed to disclose whether they were paid for research.