This Tuesday the first report on the health of trans and non-binary people in Spain was presented and the results are clear: the majority have hidden who they are in certain areas of their lives out of fear.
The Transaludes survey, carried out by the Carlos III Health Institute, shows that four in ten respondents said their health professionals did not know how to care for the group, and one in ten indicated that the staff who treated them knew it. I don’t know how to take care of them and have been told that being trans or non-binary is an illness. “The data is devastating and we cannot receive it with indifference,” says Paco González, deputy director of the Mental Health Commissioner of the Ministry of Health.
8% of trans and non-binary people do not start hormone replacement therapy for fear of rejection or health barriers. For these reasons, two thirds of those surveyed who had undergone gender reaffirmation surgery, such as facial feminization, phalloplasty or liposculpture, preferred to seek private healthcare. Additionally, many trans or non-binary people with vaginas have never had a gynecology consultation.
Beyond the health sector, Transhealth reveals that nine out of ten participants hide their gender identity in at least one aspect of their lives. Furthermore, among those who did not change their name on their DNI, half did not do so for fear of rejection from those around them, of not knowing how to do the process or of not having the right to do so. Concerning the registered sex, it appears that only 13% of non-binary people have changed this designation; One in two people who have not done so say they would change their sex if there was a third box and 20% say they would prefer to remove the mention of sex.
The study consisted of an online, anonymous survey that 1,823 trans and non-binary people from across the country responded to. 35% of participants are trans men, 23% trans women and 42% non-binary people, with an average age of around 26 years old.
Mental health and aggression
The Minority Stress Model, first formulated in 2003, asserts that people from minority groups, such as those who identify with one of the LGTBIAQ+ acronyms, have worse rates of mental health due to discrimination of which they are victims. Transalude resultsYes They are in line with this theory and show that the population surveyed suffers more from mental health problems than the average, in particular depression – this diagnosis is 11 times more common among study participants than in the general population – and anxiety – 16 times more. more common among trans and non-binary people than in the general population.
“The data obtained on suicide ideas and attempts are particularly worrying in such a young population and show that training the system to take care of the mental health of the group is not only necessary, but urgent,” says María José Belza, the researcher at the Carlos III Health Institute (ISCIII).
The study indicates that the different difficulties trans and non-binary people encounter in their transition increase their risk of suicidal ideation. Medical barriers are more dangerous than administrative barriers: barriers to changing registration names increase suicidal ideation by 26%, but barriers to surgical transition increase them by 79%.
Attacks
The study indicates that one of the main causes of poor mental health rates is transphobic violence or discrimination based on gender identity, which nine in ten of those surveyed have suffered throughout their lives. Nearly half of the participants had been physically assaulted at some point, and in eight out of ten cases, these assaults had repercussions on the health of those raped.
In addition to physical attacks, Transaludes There is a high number of sexual violence within and outside the couple. Concretely, one in five people say they have suffered an attempted or an episode of rape outside their relationship, a figure which rises to almost one in four people when asked about this type of assault on the part of the from a current or past partner.
Alex Iglesias, anthropologist and member of the team that prepared the report, emphasizes that the data collected reveals a number of attacks “much higher” than the number of people who end up denouncing, and highlights the youth of the sample: ” When we talk about the violence they have suffered throughout their lives, we are talking about lives lasting 26 years on average. All this “shows the need to develop programs for prevention, detection and protection against discrimination and violence against trans and non-binary people in all areas,” the study concludes.
A pioneering and attacked investigation
The team that prepared the report produced by the ISCIII with the support of the Ministry of Health considers this document “key” to knowing for the first time the health status of trans and non-binary people throughout the country and that this demographic can “receive services tailored to their needs.” However, they encountered obstacles during the recruitment phase of the study: the research came under attack from feminists.ranexclusivewhich provided 1,400 fraudulent responses in 48 hours.
Furthermore, in an open field option in the questionnaire, some of the people who provided false information took the opportunity to insult the research or accuse the LGTBIAQ+ group of pedophilia. In response to the boycott, the study team rejected all responses given once the avalanche of fraudulent responses began and had to move to exclusively in-person recruitment. “We would have reached double the sample size if they had not boycotted us,” calculates María José Belza, lead researcher of the study.
