The ongoing Opioid Epidemic and COVID-19 Pandemic have highlighted and exacerbated inequities in health by gender and sexuality. Gender differences in life expectancy during the Opioid Epidemic both converged and then diverged over time, with prescription drugs contributing to convergence in the early part of the epidemic and men’s higher mortality from illicit drug use contributing to divergence in the latter part of the epidemic. Recent evidence also shows elevated use in opioids among sexual and gender minority populations. Regarding COVID-19, binary sex differences in COVID outcomes have received heightened attention from the outset of the COVID-19 pandemic with male sex being associated with an increased risk of severe illness resulting in hospitalization and death. Further, gay, lesbian, or bisexual adults have higher prevalence of health conditions, as well as stress, that increased the risk of developing severe COVID-19 compared to heterosexual people.

The recent U.S. Supreme Court (SCOTUS) decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which removed federal protection for the right to have an abortion, drastically restricted abortion access among people who can get pregnant, including cisgender women, transgender men, intersex people, and adolescents. Reduced access to abortion and other essential reproductive health care will likely increase rates of adverse mental and physical health outcomes (including pregnancy-related morbidity and mortality) and financial vulnerability among the aforementioned groups. The SCOTUS decision will likely exacerbate health inequities—especially among adolescents, sexual and gender minorities, Black, Indigenous, and other people of color, poor and/or disabled people.    

Alarming patterns in population health outcomes by sex, gender, and sexual and gender minority status continue to arise. State differences in Medicaid expansion have led to large geographic differences in women’s and transgender men’s access to cancer screening. Cisgender men in the United States continue to show higher lifetime risks for heart disease, cancer, diabetes, HIV/AIDS, suicide, liver disease, and additional morbidities than women. Mental health disparities among lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender persons are large compared to heterosexual persons, especially among adolescents and young adults who experience higher rates of emotional distress, mood and anxiety symptoms, self-harm, suicidal ideation, and suicidal behavior. Monkeypox is an emerging public health emergency that disproportionately impacts sexual minority men, especially racial/ethnic sexual minority men.

A population health approach is critical for understanding and closing the gap in population health trends and disparities related to sex, gender, and sexual and gender minority identity (that interact with other social identities and positions such as race/ethnicity, socioeconomic status, immigration status, disability, etc.). The issues noted above, and many others, are embedded in structural inequalities, neighborhood and community environments, and the disparate impact of social policies, and social, economic, and political institutions. The issues are complex, interact across multiple levels of context, and are highly interdisciplinary in nature.

The goal of this year’s IAPHS conference is to provide a holistic, cutting edge, scientifically rigorous, and highly engaged forum for scholars from multiple disciplines to share current research findings, conceptual frameworks, analytic approaches, and strategies for disseminating population health research for impact. This is important to provide the evidence base to policies targeted at reducing disparities linked to gender and sexuality disparities over the life course. We have an explicit focus on health equity, considering for example gender and sexuality disparities by race/ethnicity and socioeconomic status. The conference will provide opportunities for new collaborations, to synthesize approaches and evidence, and will lead to innovative ways to improve health and reduce health inequities through outreach to policymakers and the public. The conference builds on the IAPHS core value of welcoming everyone interested in population health and health equity.