UN declares intersex genital surgeries a human rights violation

• Intersex advocates and NGO leaders convened in Geneva for a UN Human Rights Council meeting to discuss intersex surgeries, infanticide, and discrimination against intersex people.
• The recognition follows a 2013 report calling on nations to end the medical practice affecting the estimated 1 in 2,000 born with ambiguous sex traits.
• Some in the medical community bristled at the comparison of the surgery to torture, arguing that the declaration inhibits doctors’ research into and understanding of intersex patients.

“Physicians constantly say to me that lawsuits and laws are not the way to change medical practice. …And I say, I agree with you, but if you will not change your practices — then that’s what it’ll take.”

Read the full story at BuzzFeed News.

(Image Credit: M. Spencer Green/AP, via BuzzFeed)