The

life expectancy Life expectancy is a statistical measure of the average time an organism is expected to live, based on the year of its birth, current age, and other demographic factors like sex. The most commonly used measure is life expectancy at birth ...

of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people is a subject of research. Early research by the Cameron group purporting to find a significantly shorter life expectancy among homosexuals is not considered reliable, although it has been widely misused and cited. During the

AIDS crisis The AIDS epidemic, caused by HIV (Human Immunodeficiency Virus), found its way to the United States between the 1970s and 1980s, but was first noticed after doctors discovered clusters of Kaposi's sarcoma and pneumocystis pneumonia in homosexual ...

, a loss in average life expectancy was observed among gay men. In the late 2000s, research suggested "the claims of drastically increased overall mortality in gay men and lesbians appear unjustified". As of 2020, data from Sweden found no gap in mortality between homosexual and heterosexual individuals, although mortality may be higher in bisexuals. There is not yet reliable research on life expectancy of

transgender A transgender (often abbreviated as trans) person is someone whose gender identity or gender expression does not correspond with their sex assigned at birth. Many transgender people experience dysphoria, which they seek to alleviate through ...

people, although false statistics have been widely circulated.

Gay and bisexual life expectancy

Flawed claims of significantly shorter life expectancy

Cameron studies

Early studies by the controversial psychologist

Paul Cameron Paul Drummond Cameron (born November 9, 1939) is an American psychologist. Cameron has been designated by the Southern Poverty Law Center as an anti-gay extremist. While employed at various institutions, including the University of Nebraska, h ...

purported to find that homosexuals had a life expectancy 20 to 30 years shorter than heterosexuals; however his methodology and flaws make his findings unreliable. Cameron's methodology was described as "just ridiculous" by demographer Nicholas Eberstadt at the conservative

American Enterprise Institute The American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, known simply as the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), is a center-right Washington, D.C.–based think tank that researches government, politics, economics, and social welfare. A ...

; and the epidemiologist

Morten Frisch Morten Frisch is a Danish epidemiologist who works as a consultant and senior investigator at the Statens Serum Institut in Copenhagen. Education and career Frisch received his M.D. in 1989, his Ph.D. in 1995, and his D.Sc. in 2002, all from the ...

described his work ''of such a grave nature that no decent peer-reviewed scientific journal should let it pass for publication". Cameron had relied on newspaper

obituaries An obituary (obit for short) is an article about a recently deceased person. Newspapers often publish obituaries as news articles. Although obituaries tend to focus on positive aspects of the subject's life, this is not always the case. Acc ...

which clearly referred to sexual orientation. In the 1980s, Cameron was expelled from the

American Psychological Association The American Psychological Association (APA) is the largest scientific and professional organization of psychologists in the United States, with over 133,000 members, including scientists, educators, clinicians, consultants, and students. It ha ...

for violations.

Hogg et al.

Another study published in 1998 by Hogg et al. modelled the impact of AIDS deaths in

Vancouver Vancouver ( ) is a major city in western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the List of cities in British Columbia, most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the ...

between 1987 and 1992, estimating a loss of life expectancy in the gay and bisexual male population of between 8 and 20 years. The authors released a statement in 2001 clarifying that their findings would no longer be relevant as AIDS deaths had fallen significantly, primarily due to

antiretroviral therapy The management of HIV/AIDS normally includes the use of multiple antiretroviral drugs as a strategy to control HIV infection. There are several classes of antiretroviral agents that act on different stages of the HIV life-cycle. The use of multi ...

Misuse

Despite the flaws of Paul Cameron's research, and the limitations of the Hogg study, many anti-gay groups and individuals have cited these studies to characterize homosexuality as inherently dangerous or as an unhealthy "

lifestyle Lifestyle often refers to: * Lifestyle (sociology), the way a person lives * ''Otium'', ancient Roman concept of a lifestyle * Style of life (german: Lebensstil, link=no), dealing with the dynamics of personality Lifestyle may also refer to: Bu ...

". Paul Cameron's research group claimed that homosexuality is "as dangerous to public health as drug abuse, prostitution, and smoking". In 1997, the U.S. secretary of education

William Bennett William John Bennett (born July 31, 1943) is an American conservative politician and political commentator who served as secretary of education from 1985 to 1988 under President Ronald Reagan. He also held the post of director of the Office of ...

claimed that gay men die at 43 years during a television interview, a figure from a flawed Cameron study. In response to frequent misuse, Hogg et al. noted their findings would no longer be applicable in 2001. In 2003, the economist

Walter E. Williams Walter Edward Williams (March 31, 1936December 1, 2020) was an American economist, commentator, and academic. Williams was the John M. Olin Distinguished Professor of Economics at George Mason University, as well as a syndicated columnist ...

cited the Hogg study to argue that homosexuals should pay more for life insurance, stating "that's a lifestyle shortening of life expectancy greater than obesity and tobacco use". In 2012, the Australian Anglican Archbishop Peter Jensen claimed that gay people had "significantly shorter life".

Frisch 2009 and 2013 studies

The Danish epidemiologist

carried out more robust research in 2009 using marriage data from

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. His study found excess mortality was limited to the first few years of marriage, consistent with men who had preexisting illnesses (such as HIV/AIDS) marrying and dying. Frisch stated "we observed a drastic reduction from 9.63 excess deaths per 1000 person-years among those who married their partner in the pre-

HAART The management of HIV/AIDS normally includes the use of multiple antiretroviral drugs as a strategy to control HIV infection. There are several classes of antiretroviral agents that act on different stages of the HIV life-cycle. The use of multip ...

period to 1.53 excess deaths per 1000 person-years for those who married during the HAART period". According to Frisch, "the claims of drastically increased overall mortality in gay men and lesbians appear unjustified". Gay couple wedding faceless

In 2013, Frisch also carried out another study which found excess mortality in homosexual men had shrunk further. It linked same-sex marriage with increases in life expectancy.

2014 retraction

A 2014 study by Hatzenbuelher et al. purported to find that sexual minorities living in areas with high levels of anti-gay prejudice had their life expectancy reduced by 12 years. However, it was retracted in 2019 when it was discovered there was a coding error in the data, and that after correcting the error it "rendered the association between structural stigma and mortality risk no longer statistically significant".

2020 LGB mortality study

A 2020 study in Sweden found that mortality among homosexual men and women did not significantly differ from heterosexuals, although it was elevated for bisexual men and women.

Transgender life expectancy

According to Bosson et al. "the systematic research needed to determine the average life expectancy of transgender people has not yet been conducted". One unsubstantiated statistic widely circulated in the media claims that the life expectancy of

transgender women A trans woman or a transgender woman is a woman who was assigned male at birth. Trans women have a female gender identity, may experience gender dysphoria, and may transition; this process commonly includes hormone replacement therapy and ...

of color is only 35 years old; however, this is not corroborated by any research. According to sociologist Laurel Westbrook, this inaccurate statistic was calculated by averaging the age of transgender murder victims. This is an erroneous methodology for calculating life expectancy, as murder victims are not a representative population of transgender people. Several studies have been conducted that indicate that transgender individuals have an increased mortality rate, however these studies are not conclusive.

References

{{Longevity Health care

LGBT ' is an initialism that stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender. In use since the 1990s, the initialism, as well as some of its common variants, functions as an umbrella term for sexuality and gender identity. The LGBT term ...

Public health