The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is allocating almost $700,000 in taxpayer funds to support pregnancy prevention initiatives for young girls who identify as boys, highlighting the insufficiency of "heteronormative" sexual education.

The grant, amounting to $698,736, started in September 2023 and is set to run until June 2027, as revealed in government records. This funding is designated for the Center for Innovative Public Health Research, a non-profit organization aimed at developing “an inclusive teen pregnancy program for transgender boys," reports the Daily Wire.

“Youth who are assigned female at birth … are at risk for negative sexual health outcomes yet are effectively excluded from sexual health programs because gender-diverse youth do not experience the cisgender, heteronormative teen sexual education messaging available to them as salient or applicable,” the award description states.

“Data suggest that AFAB [assigned female at birth] trans-identified youth may be less likely to use condoms when having sex with people who have penises and are at least as likely as cisgender girls to be pregnant,” it goes on to say before adding that the “health inequity must be addressed.”

The Center for Innovative Public Health Research is focused on delivering sex education through a program known as “Girl2Girl.” This initiative is characterized by the organization as a text messaging-based sexual health program specifically designed for cisgender sexual minority girls aged 14 to 18 years.

The center plans to “test the resulting adaptation” with a nationwide group of “700 trans-identified AFAB youth 14-18 years of age,” This assessment will focus on their contraception usage, screening for sexually transmitted infections, and monitoring pregnancy rates.

The financial support for this initiative is provided by the National Institutes of Health’s National Institute of Nursing Research, a part of the HHS. For the fiscal year 2024, the National Institute of Nursing Research has been authorized to utilize a total of $57 million in taxpayer funds. Additionally, the Center for Innovative Public Health Research is set to obtain an additional $1.4 million from HHS for the creation of a “population-based HIV prevention program for transgender girls.” This program aims to fill the gap in HIV prevention programming that is inclusive of various gender identities.

“Messaging will be gender affirming” and will “reduce internalized transphobia,” the award description states.