Highlight a particular medical news story from the last 10 years that posed both ethical and legal dilemmas, such as the Terri Schaivo case.  

 I have chosen a case of intersex babies, which is when a baby is born with XY male chromosomes but ambiguous genitals.

Reflect on the outcome of the case. With which side of the case did you agree with? What was the ethical and legal basis for your position?  

  

I agree with the activists on intersex infants. I also believe the outcomes are unclear and would encourage the parents and medical staff to educate everyone involved regarding the risks and possible negative outcomes of performing gender assignment surgery on an infant.

The ethical basis of my position on intersexuality is, when trying to define feminine or masculine anatomy, even if you use the word “ambiguous genitalia” instead of intersexuality you still have to decide how small a baby’s penis should be to be considered “ambiguous”.

The legal basis for my position is it is the parent’s decision to make and they should have all the proper information including both short term and long term risks and negative outcomes.

Present both sides of the case and objectively debate the ethical and legal issues being presented. 

Doctor’s side: by six weeks gestation both female and male embryos develop undifferentiated gonadal tissue and can produce either female or male genitalia. Intersex occurs because somewhere along the way an abnormality happens that affects the complete masculinization or with a female some virilizing influence that acts on the developing embryo. Intersex is a condition which affects about one out of every two thousand babies. Most are easy to identify through physical exam and the parents of a baby usually wants to know if it is a boy or girl when baby is born.

Activist side: There are many reasons why when doing gender assignment surgery the wrong gender could be picked. Some conditions to consider are; hypospadias, clitoromrgaly, Complete Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome, Congenital Adrenal Hyperplasia, micropenis, True Hermaphroditism. Studies show that recipients of early gender assignment are dissatisfied with the outcomes there are also many examples in both psychological and medical literature describing the problems linked to this type of procedure.