Control Yuan members yesterday reprimanded the Ministry of Health and Welfare and the Ministry of the Interior for failing to protect the rights of intersex people.
Between 0.05 and 1.7 percent of the population is born with intersex traits, Control Yuan Vice President Sun Ta-chuan (孫大川) and Control Yuan member Gau Fehng-shian (高鳳仙) said in a report, citing UN statistics.
Based on the upper estimate, there might be 400,000 intersex people in Taiwan, they said.
Photo: Chung Li-hua, Taipei Times
The ministries have gathered no significant data on the intersex population and have never taken measures to conduct studies on the community, Sun said, adding that they have “ignored the existence of intersex people.”
They have turned a blind eye to the challenges that intersex people face — such as having a gender registered to them at birth and undergoing unnecessary surgery — let alone push for policies, he said.
The ministries’ behavior has already constituted a violation of human rights and is not in line with the principle of equality stated in Article 7 of the Constitution and the spirit of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, he said.
Due to pressure on parents to register births and insufficient medical guidelines, intersex children often undergo “normalizing” surgery too early, Sun and Gau said in their report.
The health ministry has not aided the families of intersex children by setting medical guidelines or providing them with parental handbooks, the report said, adding that this inaction might result in unnecessary surgeries and violate the rights to health and autonomy of intersex children.
For intersex people with needs that were present at birth, the National Health Insurance system’s lack of coverage for gender reassignment surgery violates the principle of equality, Gau said.
In some cases, intersex people pay for hormonal therapy out-of-pocket, she said, adding that it is also difficult for intersex people to find medical specialists.
These issues are disadvantageous to the health and care of intersex people and their right to national insurance, she said, adding that there should be research and discussion with the goal of amending the law.
As the interior ministry is redesigning its national identification card, the two urged the government to either add a third gender classification or explore other ways to specify intersex gender on the card.
The CIA has a message for Chinese government officials worried about their place in Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) government: Come work with us. The agency released two Mandarin-language videos on social media on Thursday inviting disgruntled officials to contact the CIA. The recruitment videos posted on YouTube and X racked up more than 5 million views combined in their first day. The outreach comes as CIA Director John Ratcliffe has vowed to boost the agency’s use of intelligence from human sources and its focus on China, which has recently targeted US officials with its own espionage operations. The videos are “aimed at
STEADFAST FRIEND: The bills encourage increased Taiwan-US engagement and address China’s distortion of UN Resolution 2758 to isolate Taiwan internationally The Presidential Office yesterday thanked the US House of Representatives for unanimously passing two Taiwan-related bills highlighting its solid support for Taiwan’s democracy and global participation, and for deepening bilateral relations. One of the bills, the Taiwan Assurance Implementation Act, requires the US Department of State to periodically review its guidelines for engagement with Taiwan, and report to the US Congress on the guidelines and plans to lift self-imposed limitations on US-Taiwan engagement. The other bill is the Taiwan International Solidarity Act, which clarifies that UN Resolution 2758 does not address the issue of the representation of Taiwan or its people in
DEFENDING DEMOCRACY: Taiwan shares the same values as those that fought in WWII, and nations must unite to halt the expansion of a new authoritarian bloc, Lai said The government yesterday held a commemoration ceremony for Victory in Europe (V-E) Day, joining the rest of the world for the first time to mark the anniversary of the end of World War II in Europe. Taiwan honoring V-E Day signifies “our growing connections with the international community,” President William Lai (賴清德) said at a reception in Taipei on the 80th anniversary of V-E Day. One of the major lessons of World War II is that “authoritarianism and aggression lead only to slaughter, tragedy and greater inequality,” Lai said. Even more importantly, the war also taught people that “those who cherish peace cannot
US Indo-Pacific Commander Admiral Samuel Paparo on Friday expressed concern over the rate at which China is diversifying its military exercises, the Financial Times (FT) reported on Saturday. “The rates of change on the depth and breadth of their exercises is the one non-linear effect that I’ve seen in the last year that wakes me up at night or keeps me up at night,” Paparo was quoted by FT as saying while attending the annual Sedona Forum at the McCain Institute in Arizona. Paparo also expressed concern over the speed with which China was expanding its military. While the US
RSS