#transgender-youth

#transgender-youth

New data has shown that one in six children that died by suicide in England between April 2019 and March 2025 were part of the LGBTQ+ community. Out of the 647 children that died by suicide during that time period, 107 were LGBTQ+ and 46 were transgender. The figures were obtained by QueerAF via a Freedom of Information request to the National Child Mortality Database.

An estimated 724,000 Americans in this age group identify as transgender, the institute notes. Of these, 382,800, 53 percent, live in one of the 29 states that has enacted one or more laws banning access to gender-affirming care, participation in sports, use of bathrooms and other sex-separated facilities, or gender affirmation through pronoun use. Thirty-six percent - 262,700 - live in one of the 16 states that has enacted all four such restrictions.

Lea Salonga, famed for her roles in Miss Saigon, Mulan, K-Pop Demon Hunters and Aladdin, has long been an LGBTQ+ ally. On Thursday (22 January), in a call about Les Misérables: World Tour Spectacular, in which Salonga portrays Madame Thérnardier, Salonga spoke about raising her son. Chien, who in November last year celebrated their top surgery with a heartfelt Instagram post, came out as transmasculine at the age of 14. They are now 19.

People can judge and say what they want, but at the end of the day, that's my child, and I'm going to love my baby regardless of what anybody says. And they should be allowed to have anonymity and enjoy their life exactly the way they want to enjoy it.

A recent study shows a "clinically meaningful" reduction in suicidality among transgender and gender diverse young people when they started getting hormone therapy to treat gender dysphoria, adding another piece of evidence to back keeping gender-affirming care available for trans youth. The study, published by The Journal of Pediatrics in November and appearing in the journal's February 2026 edition, examined whether hormone therapy (HT) reduced suicidality in trans and nonbinary young people.

Author Kyle Lukoff's 2019 children's book - the first in a series of picture books about the title character - follows a young transgender boy's coming-out journey at school and eventually to his parents. As public radio station WFDD notes, the book is the only one of the nearly 20,000 books in the library's children's collection to so much as mention gender identity.

shows a blatant disregard for the expertise of librarians,

The US House will vote on legislation criminalising gender-affirming care for trans young people later today (17 December) following approval from House leadership. HR 3492, dubbed the ' Protect Children's Innocence Act ', would make it a federal crime for medical professionals to prescribe puberty blockers, hormone therapy, and other kinds of gender-affirming healthcare to trans youth. If passed into law, medical professionals found guilty of providing care could face hefty fines and up to 10 years imprisonment.

"It's just cruel, and I continue to be heartbroken, overwhelmed and livid," Julie said.

"And I have this memory of my wife handing me a printout of the book, and I read it, and I was just pouring tears," he recalled. "You'd think that would be because, like, this is a beautiful story of a trans kid, and it's our kid. But actually, no. Actually, it was because it was about all of us."

At LGBTQ Nation, we give a lot of space to the people who are tearing trans kids down. It's pivotal, of course, to track the movements and policies of a hostile administration hell-bent on using trans rights as bait in its quest for supremacy and power. But what gets lost in all that noise are the others, the people who are lifting trans kids up, the ones who feed them and clothe them and love them every day for exactly who they are.

According to the Williams Institute at UCLA School of Law, about 724,000 youth ages 13-17 in the United States identify as transgender. This corresponds to approximately 3.3% of that age group, and these numbers are rising (Herman & Flores, 2025). Although a 3.3% prevalence rate among adolescents may not seem like a lot, the issue of youth transitioning has taken on an outsized role in American political discourse.

The Trevor Project is the leading LGBTQ+-centered suicide prevention and crisis intervention nonprofit in the United States. Their new study, Project SPARK (Studying Protective And RisK factors), is their first ever longitudinal study, meaning that it is set to collect data over years. Much of the data that currently exists on LGBTQ+ mental health, the researchers note, is based on data collected at a single point for each individual, rather than being able to track their progress over time.

One marker of the spurious issue play-a form the contemporary American theater features in surplus-is that it tends to be populated with puppets. Their inhabitants can, like the horror that is Tilly Norwood, look real, they can be loud or colorful or quirky, but ultimately they plug into a formula - they do what the playwright needs them to do. That's why it's refreshing to come across a play like Preston Max Allen's Caroline, the assured, affecting three-hander.

The Justice Department is demanding that hospitals turn over a wide range of sensitive information related to medical care for young transgender patients, including billing documents, communication with drug manufacturers and data such as patient dates of birth, Social Security numbers and addresses, according to a copy of a subpoena made public in a court filing this week.

The current approach for transgender youth is to affirm gender identity, but the new report calls that approach 'fundamentally misguided' and claims it harms young patients.