Health in Non-Western Contexts

Worldwide, there are an estimated 25 million trans people—that is, persons identifying in a gender other than that matching their birth-assigned sex. “The West” (often called the global North and broadly comprising the United States and Canada, most of Europe, and a scattering of high-income countries across Asia and Australasia) comprises around a quarter of the global population. It is likely home [Page 373]to a similar proportion of trans people, with the remainder living in low- and middle-income countries of Latin America and the Caribbean, Africa, and much of Asia and Oceania (the global South). Historically, the global North has accounted for most of the scholarly literature on trans people, their health and health care. Notwithstanding, nearly half of the top 30 countries linked to ...