There has been a roughly twenty-fold rise in the number of people seeking transition, with teenagers hugely over-represented. Expand
There has been a roughly twenty-fold rise in the number of people seeking transition, with teenagers hugely over-represented.
A 2017 paper [1] reports that “the prevalence of a self-reported transgender identity in children, adolescents and adults ranges from 0.5 to 1.3%, markedly higher than prevalence rates based on clinic-referred samples of adults.”
This is reflected in data from gender clinics. The UK’s Gender Identity Development Service reported [2] a twenty-fold increase in referrals over the course of the last decade:
This surge was primarily driven by adolescents, with 15 being the most common age of referral:
Similarly, a Dutch gender identity clinic reported [3] a twenty-fold increase, albeit over a longer time span: from 34 in 1980 to 686 in 2015:
New Zealand [4], Finland [5] and Canada [6] have recorded similar dramatic exponential increases.
REFERENCES
[1] Zucker, K. J. (2017). Epidemiology of gender dysphoria and transgender identity. Sexual Health 14 (5): 404-411. [Link]
[2] Gender Identity Development Service (2021). Referrals to GIDS, financial years 2010-11 to 2020-21. [Link]
[3] Wiepjes, C.M., Nota, N.M., de Blok, C.J.M., Klaver, M., de Vries, A.L.C., Wensing-Kruger, S.A., de Jongh, R.T., Bouman, M.B., Steensma, T.D., Cohen-Kettenis, P., Gooren, L.J.G., Kreukels, B.P.C. & den Heijer, M. (2018). The Amsterdam Cohort of Gender Dysphoria Study (1972-2015): Trends in Prevalence, Treatment, and Regrets. Journal of Sexual Medicine 15 (4). [Link]
[4] Delahunt, J.W., Denison, H.J., Sim, D.A., Bullock, J.J. & Krebs, J.D. (2018). Increasing rates of people identifying as transgender presenting to Endocrine Services in the Wellington region. N Z Med J 131: 33-42. [Link]
[5] Kaltiala-Heino, R., Sumia, M., Työläjärvi, M. & Lindberg, N. (2015). Two years of gender identity service for minors: overrepresentation of natal girls with severe problems in adolescent development. Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Mental Health 9 (1). [Link]
[6] Aitken, M., Steensma, T.D., Blanchard, R., VanderLaan, D.P., Wood, H., Fuentes, A., Spegg, C., Wasserman, L., Ames, M., Fitzsimmons, C.L., Leef, J.H., Lishak, V., Reim, E., Takagi, A., Vinik, J., Wreford, J., Cohen-Kettenis, P.T., de Vries, A.L., Kreukels, B.P. & Zucker, K.J. (2015). Evidence for an altered sex ratio in clinic-referred adolescents with gender dysphoria. J Sex Med 12 (3): 756-63. [Link]