New York City plans to open a city-run gender-affirming care clinic in Corona, Queens, that will provide hormone therapy to adults 19 and older and will not serve minors. The clinic will be run by the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene and is expected to offer care at no to low cost, regardless of immigration status.
City Health Commissioner Alister Martin said at a New York City Council budget hearing on Friday that opening the clinic would be “one of the first times that the public health department has ever taken that step.” Later in the day, a city health spokesperson said the service would expand this summer at the Corona Sexual Health Clinic to provide gender-affirming hormone therapy to adults 19 years of age and older.
Tiffany Cabán pressed Martin at the hearing about whether the city would expand gender-affirming care, and his answer pointed to both ambition and caution. He said the city wants to provide services for youth, but does not want to expose itself to federal clawbacks that could disrupt other care it delivers. That leaves the new clinic as a direct city-run option for adults while transgender, gender-nonconfirming and nonbinary young people remain outside the service.
The move lands as hospitals and public providers face mounting pressure over gender-affirming care. NYU Langone Health and the Mount Sinai Hospital System have both closed their gender-affirming care programs to minors, and the Trump administration has sought to limit access for minors and public insurance enrollees. Zohran Mamdani, who took office as mayor in January, had promised during his campaign to push back against that pressure, and the clinic announcement is the clearest sign yet of how his administration plans to respond.
What remains unsettled is how quickly the city can open the clinic and how many patients it will be able to serve. Officials said the expansion is expected later this summer, but they have not announced an exact opening date or the clinic’s capacity. For now, the city has drawn a line: it is stepping into direct gender-affirming care, but only for adults.
