CHANGED SEX

Evening Star, Issue 21037, 26 February 1932, Page 11

CHANGED SEX

REMARKABLE BASES Some day (and not so far off, scientists believe), the disappointed parents of a girl who expected a boy may have the change-over accomplished by treatment soon, after birth, writes H. 0. M'Kay, in the Sydney ‘ Daily Telegraph.’ At Charing Cross Hospital, London, a child aged fourteen, certified a girl at birth, has been declared to be a male. A strange reversal of family associations and of tho changeling’s outlook on life! The change is not so rare as was once thought. Several cases have been reported lately. Two occurred in Italy. Anna Almirante, born in 1907, was educated at a girls’ college and became lady secretary to a Turin establishment. In 1927 illness led her to consult a doctor, who astounded her by announcing that she was really of the opposite sex. Signorina Anna then applied to the Bologna Court - for registration as a man. This was allowed; “she” changed her name from Anna to Aldo, and is at present serving in the Alpini, the famous mountain regiment. In the same year Signorina Eenata Graziana, an cighteen-ycar-old girl at Verona, certified female at birth in 1909, was awarded status as _ a man, tho court accepting the verdict of a board of physicians that this was now her true sex. The opposite change, male to female, is a rarer phenomenon. The most extraordinary case in medical annals was recorded last year. An American woman in Paris fell in love with an artist. They were married, but the artist’s delicate health (T.B. was suspected) led him to consult a doctor. The latter staggered him by telling him that he was actually a woman—a case of “ masked sex.” Specialists confirmed the diagnosis. Finally a famous surgeon by means of a hitherto never attempted plastic operation completed tho transformation, or, rather, restoration of sex.

Strangest part of the story is the repercussion of this metamorphosis upon the “ married couple.” Their marriage was annulled and they separated. But they remain firm friends, and at last advices were travelling through Italy on a sketching tour together. Sex reversals are common among domestic animals. A hen, apparently normal, may suddenly cease laying, develop the plumage of the male, and remain so for tho rest of “ her ” life. Investigation reveals that birds are male on the right side of the body, female on the left. In hens the left side dominates the right. If anything happens to the left side, such as disease attacking it, the right side gets its chance, and the bird becomes a male. But in higher animals there are greater differences between the sexes, and this facile change-over is impossible. In addition, the battle for sex mastery in the human child is waged long before birth. A dominant chemical substance thence onwards keeps the child fixed in its sex. In other words, a pre-birth battle is fought; one sex wins, and a truce is declared. This is kept till late in life, when there is a last hope rebellion—an old man becoming “ womanish,” find vice versa. They are now considered cases of “ masked sex.” The pre-birth battle is a draw; side will yield, and development stands arrested _ halfway, until at a later stage a decisive battle is fought. It looks as if the time is at hand when chemist and plastic surgeon, working together, may force renewed battles in infancy, and by aiding either side change sex at will.