Cuban surgeons trained by Spaniards make sex changes

Havana, Cuba.- A team of Cuban surgeons, trained by Spanish specialists in a hospital in Havana, carried out genital adjustment operations on transsexual persons since the 39, last year, today revealed the newspaper. Workers

Since 2007 and up to now, 39 transplants have been performed in Cuba with a procedure that adapts the external aspect of the person's genitals to their gender identity, and that previous years had relied on the collaboration of Belgian doctors.

A detailed review of medical protocols for surgeries of sex change was also recently completed, as reported in a conference on education, guidance, and sexual therapy. took place this week in the Cuban capital.

The surgeon Maurice Padrón explained that the characteristics, complexities and requirements for performing vaginoplasty (with the skin of the penis reversed to pass from male to female) or phalloplasty ] (from woman to man) must undergo a rigorous evaluation of the National Commission of Integral Attention to Transsexual Persons .

Among the conditions for performing the procedure, the specialist cited that the person must have more than 18 years of age, a medical diagnosis of gender dysphoria and a permanent acceptance of more than one year of the sex with which he is identified.

The first operation of sex change in Cuba was It was performed in 1987, but due to social misunderstanding, his practice was interrupted for 20 years, according to the 39; digital edition of the official organ of Central Trabajadores de Cuba (CTC, the only legal union).

For a decade, these surgeries have been resumed under the protection of a resolution of the Ministry of Public Health and with the support of the National Center for Sex Education (Cenesex) led by sexologist Mariela Castro , daughter of former President Raúl Castro. ] Cenesex is a state institution that promoted sex change operations for transsexuals and the labor rights of the LGBTI community, and promotes a project in favor of the legal union before Parliament. between couples of the same sex