A survey has found that medical care for China’s transgender population is inadequate, with only six percent expressing satisfaction with access to hormone therapy and two percent happy with resources for gender reassignment.
For the survey titled the Chinese Transgender Population General Survey Report, Beijing LGBT Center and Peking University's Sociology Department, with help from the UN Development Programme and the Dutch embassy quizzed 2,060 people.
Some 62 percent of transgender people in China are in need of hormone treatment, and 51 percent are in need of gender reassignment surgery.
The survey showed 44.5 percent have thought about self-mutilation as a result of being transgender and 21.2 percent had exhibited some level of self-mutilating behavior.
Xin Ying, director of the Beijing LGBT Center told China Daily the transgender group have long been in an awkward position in the society.
"They are often confronted with serious mental problems," Xin said.