After a four-year legal battle, a couple in South Carolina has settled their landmark lawsuit against a hospital that performed irreversible surgery on their adopted intersex child.
Pam and Mark Crawford sued the Medical University of South Carolina for causing psychological damage, pain, suffering and impairment to their adopted son after his penis and testicular tissue was removed and he was assigned a female identity.
The decision was made while he was under the care of the South Carolina Department of Social Services, which consulted the Greenville Hospital System about the surgery.
The Crawfords also sued Greenville—which settled its lawsuit with them in 2016 for $20,000.
He added that the child—known only as M.C.—would ask when he would grow a penis.
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“We’re always really matter-of-fact about it,” Mark Crawford said. “He gets sad as he realises more and more what has happened to him.”
His wife added, “I would give anything for this not to have been done to our child. I want to see that his suffering will not be entirely wasted.”
The historic lawsuit is believed to be the first of its kind and activists are hailing it as a step forward for intersex rights.
“It’s the only lawsuit we’re aware of that’s become public at all,” Bo Laurent, who founded the Intersex Society of North America and testified in M.C.’s case, told .
“More and more, surgeons are going to realise that they’re at risk of these suits. Nobody can say this was uncontroversial standard practice. It is controversial.”
Human Rights Watch (HRW) published a last week highlighting the traumatic and unnecessary surgery that intersex babies are subjected to.
Kyle Knight, a researcher from HRW who contributed to the report there is still a long way to go in establishing legal rights for intersex infants who are unable to give their consent to the life-changing surgeries.
“While a positive outcome for the child who went through all of that, the lawsuit doesn’t do anything to address the regulatory void that allows surgeries like this to happen in the first place.
“Not even the hospital involved in the suit has given any indication that it intends to stop conducting such surgeries on children too young to give consent.”
