With all the media coverage lately around Gay Pride events, as
well as around marriage equality, it is ironic that so little is
really known about the lives and health needs of lesbian, gay,
bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people. This lack of specific
information on the LGBT community is not just an academic
problem; policymakers, especially those in government, demand
real numbers to document the existence of problems. This is
particularly true in these tough economic times, as funders,
government officials and state agencies rightly demand efficient
programs that are targeted like laser beams on specific,
documented problems. In this context as with so many things,
knowledge equals power: the power to allocate resources and work
to fix these problems. At the national level, researchers have
estimated that LGBT people lag behind on seven of the ten
targets set by the U.S. government to improve health nationally,
called Healthy People 2010. In New York City, we know that LGBT
lag behind on at least six of NY