The study found that lesbian and bisexual women have a greater mortality risk than heterosexual women because of the negative effects of ‘toxic’ societal stigma

Bisexual women had a 37% greater chance of dying young than heterosexual women, while lesbian women had a 20% higher risk, according to one of the biggest studies examining mortality variations by sexual orientation. The long-standing problem of health disparities among women who identify as sexual minorities is illuminated by this research, which is the first of its type to differentiate between lesbian and bisexual women. There has been little study on mortality disparities, especially across different subgroups within the sexual minority community, despite the fact that earlier studies have widely shown disparities in a variety of health outcomes between women who identify as sexual minorities and their heterosexual counterparts.

The Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, the University of Utah, Boston Children’s Hospital, Columbia University, and other organizations have collaborated with researchers from the Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Institute to produce the latest findings, which highlight substantial health disparities that contribute to notable variations in mortality rates.

The Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Institute’s Sarah McKetta, the lead author, highlights the urgent need to address the preventable causes of these disparities in sexual orientation, particularly in light of the country’s increasingly hostile policy environment toward LGBTQ people.

Dr. McKetta goes on to say that stigma, prejudice, and discrimination against LGBTQ people are specific and may take many negative forms. This demographic is more vulnerable to worse health outcomes and early death because of these cultural demands, which also lead to improper coping techniques and chronic stress.

Researchers point to the study’s capacity to stratify data depending on the sexual orientation subgroup as a key strength. Brittany Charlton, the senior author, is an associate professor of population medicine at Harvard Medical School and the Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Institute. She emphasizes how biphobia causes specific pressures for bisexual women, both within and outside the LGBTQ community.

Charlton goes on to say that presumptions about bisexuality made based on a partner’s gender often lead to the exclusion of bisexual people from a variety of societies. Bisexual women had a higher than average risk of early death, which is alarming and highlights the need for focused measures to lower these differences in all sexual minority groups.

The researchers provide doable first actions that might be included into healthcare delivery systems. These include requiring culturally-informed training for healthcare professionals caring for patients who identify as sexual minorities, improving screening and referral for treatment of tobacco, alcohol, and other substance use, and implementing evidence-based preventive screening for women who identify as sexual minorities without making assumptions based on identity. Because all research participants were nurses and so benefitted from a multitude of preventive variables not available to the general community, Dr. McKetta observes that although the results are noteworthy, they may potentially show an even wider discrepancy among the larger U.S. population.

In order to guarantee that everyone has the chance to live a long and healthy life, Dr. McKetta emphasizes the need of doing more study to pinpoint the precise variables increasing or reducing these risks. In this respect, Dr. Charlton highlights the need of taking collective action in order to address the systems and institutions that compromise the dignity and well-being of LGBTQ people.