Gender Identity Disorder is now universally recognised as a diagnosable and real medical condition, and there are 200 to 300 people with it in this State, the High Court heard yesterday.
Mr Bill Shipsey SC said it occurred in one in 12,000 male births with male-to-female orientation and one in 40,000 female births with female-to-male orientation. Not all of those affected decide to do anything about their condition, by way of taking hormones or gender reassignment.
He was speaking during closing submissions in a judicial review action brought by a Co Kildare dentist against the Registrar of Births, Deaths and Marriages.
Dr Lydia Annice Foy (54) of Athy is seeking an order to compel the registrar to change the gender classification on her birth certificate from male to female.
Born in 1947, Dr Foy was registered as a male and named Donal Mark. In 1977, he married Ann Foy and they had two daughters. The marriage ended in the early 1990s and in 1992 the doctor underwent genital surgery. The following year the doctor by deed poll changed names to Lydia Annice.
Mr Shipsey, for Dr Foy, said from the medical evidence the judge would see that Dr Foy was diagnosed as a male-to-female transsexual, that she was treated for this condition and that she had undergone reconstructive surgery.
It was historically incorrect, however, to say that gender reassignment surgery changed one's sex. Gender Identity Disorder was diagnosed before such surgery, which occurred to give such a person a better quality of life.
The court could take the view that Dr Foy was now to be regarded as female and that it was wrong to regard a birth register as a historical record that was immutable. Relying on external genitalia in determining the sex of an infant was simply an act of faith rather than a statement of immutable fact for all time.
The proceedings continue today.