Michigan’s largest health care system caved to pressure from transgender activists just days after announcing an end to sex change treatments for kids.

Grand Rapids-based Corewell Health announced Wednesday it’s “lifting (the) pause” on new “gender-affirming” hormone treatments for minors undergoing a sex change the company instituted on Friday, WOOD reports.

“We briefly paused beginning these therapies to allow us time to assess the potential impact that recent policy changes might have on our patients and their health,” Corewell said in a statement.

Go Ad-Free, Get Content, Go Premium Today - $1 Trial

President Donald Trump last month issued an executive order titled “Protecting Children from Chemical and Surgical Mutilation” that promises to end federal aid to medical institutions that engage in “gender affirming care” for minors.

“The head of each executive department or agency (agency) that provides research or education grants to medical institutions, including medical schools and hospitals, shall, consistent with applicable law and in coordination with the Director of the Office of Management and Budget, immediately take appropriate steps to ensure that institutions receiving Federal research or education grants end the chemical and surgical mutilation of children,” the EO reads.

“Across the country today, medical professionals are maiming and sterilizing a growing number of impressionable children under the radical and false claim that adults can change a child’s sex through a series of irreversible medical interventions,” according to the order. “This dangerous trend will be a stain on our Nation’s history, and it must end.”

Corewell became the first Michigan health system to comply with Trump’s EO when officials on Friday announced an end to new hormone treatments for minors, a decision that sparked immediate backlash from transgender activists at Equality Michigan, HIV/AIDS Alliance of Michigan, the NAACP Michigan State Conference, ACLU of Michigan and 37 other groups that signed on to a letter calling for the health system’s board of directors to reconsider the decision, Michigan Advance reports.

Go Ad-Free, Get Content, Go Premium Today - $1 Trial

The letter cited guidance from Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel: “Refusing healthcare services to a class of individuals based on their perceived status, such as withholding the availability of services from transgender individuals based on their gender identity or their diagnosis of gender dysphoria, while offering such services to cisgender individuals, may constitute discrimination under Michigan law.”

In Corewell’s announcement Friday, the company noted it would continue hormone therapy for transgender kids already receiving it, and for other conditions like fibromyalgia and endometriosis. Corewell contends it does not perform sex change surgeries on kids.

Corewell Health, created through a 2022 merger of Beaumont Health and Spectrum Health, is the largest health system in Michigan with over 60,000 employees across 22 hospitals.

Equality Michigan applauded the company’s decision to reverse course, which Executive Director Erin Knott said would “ensure that they can continue to access essential, age-appropriate medical care from licensed clinicians practicing according to the well-established standards of care.”

“We see this decision as one that’s family-centered, equality-centered, and science-centered. The pain and confusion endured by families and young people who had appointments cancelled was tragic and avoidable. The best time to make the right decision was yesterday, but the next best time to make the right decision was today. So, we extend a thank you to the Corewell leadership team for righting the ship,” Knott said in a Wednesday statement cited by the Advance.

Corewell’s initial decision to comply with Trump’s EO did not come without consequences.

Ferndale Pride returned Corewell’s $2,500 sponsorship for the group’s 2025 gay pride celebration, the Detroit Free Press reports.

“Since something was happening to harm our community, we had to take action,” Julia Music, Ferndale Pride executive director, told the news site.

The event is now working to land new sponsors to fill the void from Corewell, as well as a $3,500 sponsorship from Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan the company opted not to renew this year, Music said.

“They just said that they don’t have money for these events,” Music told the Free Press of Blue Cross’ reasoning for nixing the sponsorship. “It was just a very, a vague statement.”

Corewell’s reversal in Michigan plays out as Trump’s executive order faces a legal challenge from the ACLU, Lambda Legal, and other transgender advocacy groups.

“The President’s denial of care order is morally reprehensible and patently unlawful. The federal government – particularly, this administration – has no right to insert itself into conversations and decision-making that rightly belongs only to patients, their families, and their medical providers” Omar Gonzalez-Pagan, senior counsel for Lambda Legal said in a statement.

“This broadside condemns transgender young people to extreme and unnecessary pain and suffering, and for minors, it subjects their parents to agonized futility in caring for their child — all while denying them access to the same medically recommended health care that is readily available to their non-transgender peers.”

The lawsuit, filed in the federal District Court of the District of Maryland, seeks an immediate restraining order to block enforcement of Trump’s EO.