PLAYING FOR THE OTHER TEAM -- From the Economist

"The next generation of transgender schoolchildren may have a better time.  Under a law passed this week, from January they will be allowed to use toilets and join sports teams according to the gender they identify with rather than the sex on their birth certificate.  The law's backers say it merely clarifies existing [California] protections.  Even so, it is the first such statewide statute in America, although a handful of other states have similar policies."

"Data on the transgender population are scarce; the Census Bureau does not ask about gender identity, and definitions are inconsistent.  What numbers there are suggest that anything between 0.1% and 0.7% of Americans have a gender identification that differs in some way from their sex at birth.  That could mean there are 30,000 transgender children in California's public schools, although not all will take advantage of the new law."

Dana DeAndra Turner, 1954-2012

"Reports pain a grim picture of life for the transgendered; they are likelier to be unemployed, live in poverty or to attempt suicide than other Americans.  Yet attitudes are changing quick
ly, says Norman Spack, a paediatric endocrinologist whose Boston clinic has treated around 170 transgender pubescent children since 2007."