One of FOLX’s strengths is that it relies heavily on Instagram influencers, a tried-and-true method that allows them to build their audiences by capitalizing on the established audience already cultivated by queer influencers. And Instagram is key here, considering their branding strategy. Hidden behind the bright colors and the branding of their website is important information that doesn’t work as algorithmically pleasing content for Instagram. One has to wonder how you flip a cis-tem on its head while directly benefiting from its funding. At first scroll of their website, you’ll see slogans like “we’re flipping the cis-tem on it’s head” and well-shot photos of queer people living their truths. FOLX sells itself as a community forward company, and their branding focusing on messages of “for us, by us” takes great pains to put queer people at the center of the conversation. Trans people have needed proper safe and affirming healthcare since time immemorial, so a service aiming to fill that gap should recognize that the trans community is ever-expanding and our needs are too. Taken at face value, this all sounds okay.
While currently only offering basic hormone replacement regimens, they claim on their website that there are future plans for PrEP, STI tests, erectile dysfunction medication, and more. Donations can be given through Trans Lifeline, which will then redistribute to FOLX, who will then cover one year of HRT and related costs like labs and clinician check-ins. They simultaneously launched a partnership with nonprofit organization Trans Lifeline, creating what they call the HRT Care Fund, which aims to“radically redistribute financial resources to support transgender, nonbinary, and gender-nonconforming folx.” They make a point of saying the care fund is specifically for allies to underwrite the cost of HRT medication through FOLX. FOLX soft launched in January, offering their service in 12 states: California, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Illinois, Maryland, New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Texas, Virginia, and Washington.
As a comprehensive healthcare experience for trans people, it’s doing something that’s seemingly revolutionary. Statistics estimate that roughly 31 percent of trans people in America lack access to proper healthcare, creating a crisis in immediate need of a solution. Either way, you’re in control.” At first glance, this concept is infallible: Trans healthcare in America is precarious at best, and barriers to access manifest in a variety of forms, such as the religious freedom to discriminate, lack of physical access to clinics, medical gatekeeping, or the high unemployment rate of trans workers. Its website features a range of faces of all types of people, and offers comforting messages like, “Start with us or switch your care. Or more telling, how FOLX found me.įOLX is a new startup, formed in Boston, that has the tagline “Queer & Trans Health, Delivered On Our Terms.” The company seeks to provide trans healthcare to people who have been long pushed to the sidelines and had their needs ignored, intentionally or otherwise. My journeys to pick up supplies for my hormone replacement therapy regimen are the most consistent out of the house routines I have.
Otherwise, I only go to my pharmacist to buy my monthlies: a bottle of estrogen, syringes, needles in both 35 and 22 gauge, and my pills. My phone’s GPS knows I don’t leave these four walls that much, maybe for the occasional coffee at my neighborhood spot here and there. These days it tends to be comfortable jumpsuits and at-home workout equipment. The ads are targeted to get me where my wallet lives. It allows me to slow down and peruse an endless feed of people, cats, and take-out meals-only to, as is par for the course, be interrupted by the occasional ad that’s curated based on my profile and the links I’ve recently clicked. I wake up, fumble for my glasses, and mindlessly scroll social media feeds while the rest of my body catches up. Photo credit: National Cancer Institute on Unsplash
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