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To snip or not to snip? That is the question on the minds of many expectant parents.
Circumcision, the centuries-old ritual of removing an infant's foreskin, has long been associated with cultural and religious practices for various reasons. Over the years, however, this practice has been on the decline.
According to The Washington Post, the rate at which U.S. male newborns are undergoing the procedure has dropped to about 56 percent since peaking at about 80 percent in the 1960s. For more than a decade, the American Academy of Pediatrics has backed away from routinely recommending circumcision, citing that the evidence of its benefits wasn't strong enough to endorse such a routine procedure.
But now, due to a spate of recent studies, the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is about to step into the ring with a possible recommendation for neonatal circumcision, as well as for individual men, as an additional HIV prevention measure.
According to the latest research, circumcision has more health benefits than originally thought, including reducing the risk for urinary tract infections in infants, as well as the risks of an adult male getting penile cancer or becoming infected with sexually transmitted diseases such as syphilis, AIDS, herpes and the human papillomavirus (HPV), which causes genital warts in men and cervical cancer in women.
The CDC will release a draft of its recommendations by this summer, the Post reports, and officials are quick to point out that these will serve purely as guidance and should in no way be seen as a mandate. The division between the opposing schools of thought is fraught with emotion and science.
Critics of circumcision liken the procedure to genital mutilation.
"Circumcision is not an ethical medical procedure," Georganne Chapin, executive director of Intact America, an advocacy group in Tarrytown, N.Y., tells the Post. "You are removing a perfectly normal body part. We don't allow people to do that to their daughters. We should not let them do it to their sons."
But proponents of the procedure cite recent studies, such as the one published last week in the Archives of Pediatric & Adolescent Medicine, that say circumcision cuts the risk of getting HPV and herpes by about a third.
"If we had a vaccine that was as effective as [circumcision] at reducing the risk, we'd be jumping up and down with joy," Arleen A. Leibowitz, a professor of public policy at UCLA, tells the newspaper.
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ReaderComments (Page 1 of 1)
1-21-2010 @ 1:53PM
Alena said...And growing breasts drastically increases risk of breast cancer. Let's chop those off too!
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1-21-2010 @ 4:01PM
John said...Infant circumcision is considerably more than a "snip" - "snip" is what you might call trimming your fingernails or the ends of your hair. Infant circumcision is an irreversible and damaging surgical amputation and resection still done without sufficient or any anesthesia and without individual consent. MGM is, sadly, still a procedure in search of a compelling reason which violates morals and ethics in the name of religion and custom. It is time that boys were legally protected from genital mutilation as girls are now and this barbaric ritual left to the individual's choice as an informed adult.
Reply
1-21-2010 @ 5:23PM
Ron Low said...It's shocking that anyone could consider taking pleasure-receptive body parts from healthy normal babies. This whole business of STD risk is irrelevant to infants. By the time it is relevant, that person whose body it is can decide for himself based on the best evidence then available.
Circumcision carries huge risks. Hundreds die every year. And just Google "circumcision damage" to see horrid cosmetic and functional outcomes that don't manifest until puberty and are never mentioned on the parental consent form.
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1-21-2010 @ 10:21PM
Restoring Tally said...How come no one mentions the Lancet study that showed that the women partners of circumcised men have a greater than 50% increased risk of HIV infection. See "Circumcision in HIV-infected men and its effect on HIV transmission to female partners in Rakai, Uganda: a randomised controlled trial"
This study shows male circumcision hurts women. Why is no one addressing the increased risk to women?
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1-22-2010 @ 12:25AM
John said...Infant circumcision is hardly a simple "snip" - "snip" is what you do to your fingernails or the ends of your hair. Infant circumcision is surgical amputation and resection usually still done with inadequate pain control to an individual without their informed consent. MGM is mutilation sanctioned by religion, custom, and ignorance and a violation of ethics and morals. It is way past time for boys to be legally protected from this assault as girls are now.
I, for one, am so glad that the internet has opened up this archaic and damaging rite to public scrutiny.
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1-22-2010 @ 9:42PM
David47 said...Look! The emperor has no cloths.
Most of the prime movers pushing circumcision in the USA have a Jewish connection. This pro-circumcsion article is just another likely example.
In the end the issue is not about health, but rather how to hold on to an ally for Israel. Otherwise Israel will end up being the last country in the world that still mutilates its baby boys.
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2-01-2010 @ 8:35PM
Dionna @ Code Name: Mama said...It's obvious what the author's slant on the topic is, since she only cited "research" that is pro-cutting.
“The United States has the highest rate of HIV infection and the highest rate of male circumcision in the industrialized world. Male circumcision, therefore, cannot reasonably be thought to prevent HIV infection.” **
I know a better method of preventing STD's - sexual education and condoms use. Advising parents to mutilate their son's penis is like telling them to pull all of their teeth so they won't get cavities.
**HIV Statement (citing Quinn TC, Wawer MJ, Sewankambo N, al., for the Rakai Project Study Group. Viral load and heterosexual transmission of human immunodefficiency virus type 1. N Engl J Med 2000;1342:921-29. [Abstract])
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9-26-2010 @ 12:12AM
Laura J. said...For those who are critics of circumcision due to lack of individual consent (the infant)....when's the last time you considered that argument when defending "choice" for abortion? Seems silly to me that we are so concerned about a flimsy little flap of skin and don't even worry about a whole life being lost.
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