Intersex care in the United States and international standards of human rights

ABSTRACT

Deeply rooted on human rights principles, there is a growing international agreement to prohibit non-consensual medical interventions to intersex persons. In contrast, medical protocols for intersex care in the United States are guided by clinical wisdom and guidelines that are not legally binding. But as the medical profession is called to respect and to champion the right to health within human rights principles, expert opinion in the United States has become unsettled when confronted with current standards of intersex care. In this study, we tracked the human rights arguments by international institutions that effectively impacted clinical standards for the care of intersex persons around the globe during this decade, and we studied the use of rhetoric by key policy stakeholders that seek to uphold intersex medical care in the United States to these international standards. We conclude that the medical establishment in the United States does not meet international standards of human rights as it enforces an outdated definition of ‘sex’.

KEYWORDS:

• Intersexuality
• standards of care
• clinical guidelines
• human rights
• sexual rights

Acknowledgements

An earlier version of this work was published in abstract form; PRHSJ (2019) 38, 52. This text reflects part of the postdoctoral work by C.E.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.