Video: 'Illegal' for US military to deny Bradley Manning sex change In a written statement read on NBC News's 'Today' programme, Manning said he wants to start hormone therapy as soon as possible and asked supporters to refer to him by his new name, Chelsea, and to use the feminine pronoun. I'm gong to become the smartest person on ensuring that a soldier who is in confinement who has gender dysphoria gets appropriate medical treatment. I know that recently there was a story, I think 'Courthouse News' ran it, where a Fort Leavenworth spokesperson said, 'We don't have certain treatment, that's not what we give.' I'm going to change that," said David Coombs. Transgender advocates said it should not be up to the army to decide if Manning gets hormone therapy. In the United States it is illegal to deny health care to prisoners. Now the Army can claim that this isn't health care, but they have the weight of the medical profession and science against them," said Mara Keisling from the US National Centre for Transgender Equality. Manning, 25, was sentenced on Wednesday to 35 years in a military prison for turning over classified files to WikiLeaks. He will serve the 35-year-old sentence at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, where a spokesman said the soldier would have to petition for a transfer to a federal prison for hormone treatment.