FILE- In this Feb. 27, 2019 file photo, Army Staff Sgt. Patricia King, second from right, together with other transgender military members, from left, Navy Lt. Cmdr. Blake Dremann, Army Capt. Alivia Stehlik, Army Capt. Jennifer Peace and Navy Petty Officer Third Class Akira Wyatt, testify about their military service before a House Armed Services Subcommittee on Military Personnel hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington. A new Trump administration regulation set to go into effect Friday, April 12, directs military secretaries to kick out transgender service members who refuse to serve in their birth sex and "given an opportunity to correct those deficiencies." (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta, File) Associated Press

SAN DIEGO (AP) — A new Trump administration regulation set to go into effect Friday directs military secretaries to kick out transgender service members who refuse to serve in their birth sex and "given an opportunity to correct those deficiencies."

The American Medical Association told The Associated Press Thursday that the policy and its wording mischaracterizes transgender people as having a "deficiency."

It contends it defies science by classifying the need to transition to another gender among "administratively disqualifying conditions" that include those the Pentagon has labeled as a "congenital or developmental defects."

The Pentagon says its use of the word deficiencies refers to failing to meet military standards and does not refer to identifying with another gender.

The policy requires transgender troops to adhere to their biological sex.