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Homosexuality - statistics - numbers and relationships
Homosexuality - statistics - numbers and relationships

Statistics - same-sex relationships and homosexuality

Up-to-date information on key areas . . .

1. Number of homosexuals in Australia
Nationwide figure - 1.2% of adults identify as homosexual or lesbian.
* 1.6% of adult men identified as homosexual and 0.8% of women as lesbian.
* 1.4% of women and 0.9% of men said they were bisexual.
Source: The 2003 'Sex in Australia' survey of 20,000 people, with a special weighting to Sydney's homosexual centre. Conducted by the Australian Research Centre in Sex, Health & Society (ARCSHS) at La Trobe University. Published in Australian & NZ Journal of Public Health, Vol 27 No 2 2003 ISSN 1326 0200.

CANADA – (as comparison)
1.3% of men and 0.7% of women considered themselves homosexual.
0.9% of women, compared with 0.6% of men, said they were bisexual.
Source: Canadian Community Health Survey, June 2004. A Canadian government survey of 83,000 people. Ref: Statistics Canada. Click here.

2. Number of homosexual “couples"
Same sex couples make up 0.46 % of all couples in Australia.
(19,594 couples, 2001 census)
The 2001 census showed that over 8 million men and women were living as partners in couple relationships and that 12% of these were ‘de facto married’.
Ten years prior the 1991 census indicated that around 7.2 million men and women were living as partners in couple relationships and that 8% of these were de facto married.
Same sex couples make up 0.46 % of all couples (2001).
Source: 3310.0 Marriages and Divorces, Australia, Nov 2003, Australian Bureau of Statistics. Click here.

Sweden and Norway
Statistics for Sweden show only 0.55% of couples are same-sex and in Norway 0.68%.

UK
In the UK, the latest census shows 10.3 million married couples, 2 million heterosexual de facto couples and 39,261 same-sex couples. This gives 0.318% of all couples are homosexual couples. [The Times, 4 Feb 2004]

3. Homosexual marriage and ‘civil union’ relationships
In The Netherlands, where same sex couples are allowed to ‘marry’, a recent study published in AIDS magazine, found that the average length of a relationship between two men is 1.5 years. In addition the study found that they have eight other ‘partners’ each year.
Source: Lifesite. Click here.

The Netherlands
Official statistics from The Netherlands government show that few homosexuals actually get married. “Another important change in formal union behaviour in The Netherlands is the fact that homosexuals may not get married. This has been legal since 2001. … The number of homosexual marriage is still small; in 2002 just under 1,000 marriages between two men and fewer still between two women were registered.”
‘Economic circumstances and union dissolution in the 1990s in The Netherlands’ ,
Dr D Manting and Dr D Loeve, Statistics Netherlands.

Scandinavia
In 'homosexual-friendly’ Scandinavian countries, where same-sex ‘civil union’ type relationships have existed for 10 years, male-male union breakdown (‘divorce’) is 50% higher than heterosexual unions. For female-female coupling the breakdown figure is 170% higher.
Source: Deathblow to Marriage, Kurtz, National Review.
Click here.

Homosexual relationships in Australia
These figures are taken from studies done by the National Centre in HIV Social Research at The University of New South Wales.
From the Melbourne Gay Community Periodic Survey (MCGPS)
Regular Partners
MGCPS (Feb. 2000) interviewed homosexual men at Melbourne’s midsumma carnival and homosexual venues and found that:
27.6% of homosexual men say they have ‘only regular’ partners,
35.1% have regular PLUS casual and 24.4 % have only casual sex.
70.3% said they had sexual contact with casual partners in previous 6 months

Number of Sex Partners
(MGCPS Feb. 2000) When questioned about the number of sex partners in the previous six months:
One - 20.7 %, 2 to 10 - 39 %, 11 to 50 - 26.2 %, Over 50 - 7.8 %
Thus 73 % have had more than one partner in the previous six months.

Length of Relationships
Changed in previous six months - 40.4 %, 6 mths to 1year 9.8 %, 1 to 2 yrs - 18.8 %,
3 to 5 years - 15.3%, over 5 years - 15.7 %

Therefore 50% lasted less than one year and 68% lasted less than 2 years.
(Includes data from ‘Men and Sexual Health’, by the National Centre in HIV Social Research, 1997)

Author: Jenny Stokes | Modified: 31 January 2008

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