AMHERST — For one patient, the question centered on whether it would be appropriate to stockpile medicines, such as hormones, prior to Inauguration Day. For another patient, the question focused on getting a hysterectomy scheduled before Jan. 20, 2025.

As a physician at the Cooley Dickinson Medical Group, providing gender-affirming care for more than 10 years, Dr. Miranda Balkin is seeing firsthand concerns over how people’s medical decisions may be impacted by a second Donald Trump presidency.

“I have these conversations every day, and it breaks my heart,” said Balkin, speaking to about 35 Amherst Regional High School and Middle School students, and a few elementary school students, during a local “Nationwide Walkout for #ERA” rally held on the Town Common Tuesday afternoon.

Organized by the Young Feminist Party of Amherst, the National Day of Action is calling for immediate publication of the Equal Rights Amendment by President Joe Biden as a way to defend abortion and LGBTQ+ rights, before Trump returns to the White House next month. Proponents have argued that the amendment has been passed by the necessary three-quarters of the states, after Virginia became the 38th state to ratify in 2020, though others say that three of the states ratifications came after a congressionally set June 30, 1982 deadline, and five states later rescinded their ratifications.

Balkin said she fears the possible rolling back of protections for transgender individuals and stripping reproductive rights, and that what is happening is the punishing of parents, doctors and children, and doing harm by attempting to prevent gender expression.

But Balkin and her colleagues are committed to preserving safe, healthy and strong care for all. “I want to fight so hard to preserve that freedom and safety you have,” Balkin said.

The action was also scheduled to coincide with the U.S. Supreme Court hearing arguments in U.S. v. Skremetti, a lawsuit challenging a Tennessee law that bans certain health care treatments for transgender Tennessee youth, commonly provided for cisgender youth.

On a raw, chilly day, with dense clouds, the students marched through town center, chanting “hands off our bodies,” and “abortion is a civil right, war on health care we will fight,” before an open mic gave anyone an opportunity to provide personal accounts of the challenges being encountered.

“All of our voices are critical in this fight,” said Young Feminist Party founder and director Marisol Pierce Bonifaz, a high school senior who coordinated the event.

One nonbinary student, who uses they/ them pronouns, recounted how life is now better living with their mother rather than their father, who couldn’t appreciate and recognize anything but a cisgender child.

State Rep. Mindy Domb, D-Amherst, pledged to continue to protect access, pointing out that the Legislature has codified reproductive rights and gender-affirming care

“And we are not going back,” Domb said. Domb said it’s not government’s place to decide what makes people their authentic selves, and pledged to fight and defend human health care as a right over the next four years.

Inanna Balkin, a 10th grader, said she was at the rally to keep up hope and to help ensure students will have bodily autonomy and be able to make their own decisions. “Our government gets to decide if a person lives in a body they are comfortable with?” Balkin said.

Four members of the Fort River School’s Equal Rights Amendment Club, a recently launched group at the elementary school that is supporting adoption of the ERA, while also promoting access to reproductive and gender affirming care, also got a chance to speak and meet up with their older peers.

After the open mic portion concluded, fifth-grader Camila Gonzalez-Barros observed that the struggles transgender youth are facing will only grow in the coming years.

“I see so many people suffering because of this,” Camila said. “People had to run away from their families; that is horrible.”

“We need to all be respected for who we are,” said fifth grader Aminata Sarr. “It’s important to choose who we are and be able to decide who we are, aside from our assigned genders at birth.”

Ella Templeton-Suzuki, also a fifth grader, said it’s sad that people may not be able to make their own choices to meet their own needs.

“We should be able to be who we are,” Ella said. “Why does government get to decide?”

While uncertainty around whether such rallies will sway President Biden to publish the ERA, fifth grader Nyasa Potter-Ndiaye said there is hope. “Even though some of my friends say it’s not going to work, I want to believe,” Nyasa said.

Pierce Bonifaz said with the younger students now involved, she hopes they can be matched with tutors at the high school and middle school to inspire the next generation of activists and grow the Young Feminist Party’s membership.

Prior to the rally, Superintendent E. Xiomara Herman sent a notice to families that students participating in the walkout would need to get written permission from their parents or guardians. “While I deeply value student voice and their engagement in advocacy for issues they care about, I hold student safety as my highest priority.”

Some of the students were, in fact, joined by their parents and guardians, lending support for the walkout, with at least one shouting “Thank you, Mindy” after Domb’s brief speech.

Scott Merzbach can be reached at smerzbach@gazettenet.com.