Male Circumcision and HIV

TELEGRAPH: Infant and child circumcision could violate Human Rights Act (UK)

The Telegraph reports that a lecturer in ethics at Glasgow University has published a paper in the journal Clinical Ethics, arguing that it is unethical to circumcise boys for no medical reason. Dr. David Shaw writes that a doctor who performs infant male circumcision without therapeutic indication may commit negligence and be in breach of the Human Rights Act (UK) because a child cannot consent and child circumcision is not in the best interests of boys.

Essentially Dr. Shaw argues that circumcision, if it is to be carried out by medical staff, must be indicated. Absence of indication As such, it is subject to the same ethical considerations as any other medical procedure. Moreover, religious grounds do not apply because the infant patient is not in a position to hold religious views consent.

Dr. Shaw writes a long paper to methodically take apart the absurd notion, concocted to dance around a practice deeply embedded in society, that parents are the proxy patient when it comes to infant circumcision. He argues rather that the general consensus that circumcision is never medically indicated for infants and rarely for children makes its application negligent where it is the parents making the request for cultural or religious reasons.

This echoes Intact America's simple slogan during the AAP NCE 2009 conference: "The baby, not the parent, is your patient."

You can download a pdf version of Dr. Shaw's paper here.

Dr. Shaw may be contacted at the following address.

Dental School
Faculty of Medicine and Centre for Applied Ethics & Legal Philosophy
University of Glasgow
378 Sauchiehall Street
Glasgow G2 3JZ
UK

E-mail: d.shaw@dental.gla.ac.uk

INTACT AMERICA: Say No to Infant Circumcision - The Baby, Not The Parent, Is Your Patient

Intact America Urges Pediatricians to Say No to Infant Circumcision - The Baby, Not The Parent, Is Your Patient

ISSUES OPEN LETTER CALLING ON ATTENDEES AT AMERICAN ACADEMY OF PEDIATRICS MEETING TO REJECT CALL TO RECOMMEND IN FAVOR OF CIRCUMCISION FOR FIRST TIME UNNECESSARY, RISKY SURGERY FAILS TESTS OF MEDICAL ETHICS AND HUMAN RIGHTS

WASHINGTON, Oct. 19 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Leaders of Intact America (www.intactamerica.org) today issued a call to conscience to doctors at the annual meeting of the American Academy of Pediatrics, urging them to say no to neonatal male circumcision.

Medical ethics requires informed consent of the patient before any surgical procedure or invasive treatment is carried out. Parental consent on behalf of a child is generally accepted only if the surgery is necessary to save the life or the health of the child. Because circumcision removes healthy, functional tissue and is not medically necessary, parental consent is inadequate. Intact America placed an ad in today's Washington Post urging pediatricians to say no to circumcision because "the baby, not the parent, is your patient."

Neonatal circumcision is performed on more than 1 million babies each year in the United States. The AAP is awaiting a report by a special task force on circumcision, considering whether for the first time to recommend in favor of the surgery. Evidence being considered by the task force comes from studies carried out in Sub-Saharan Africa, among adult men, which examined the role circumcision might play in mitigating HIV transmission. Researchers claim that circumcision reduced female-to-male transmission of HIV. However, no similar reduction was found for male-to-female or male-to-male transmission. In fact, recent studies were ended prematurely because women were contracting HIV at alarmingly higher rates than those in control groups from men who were failing to take the only universally-recognized anti-HIV measure, use of a condom.

The Centers for Disease Control, which is also citing the African studies in as it revisits its neutral stance on neonatal male circumcision, recently acknowledged there is no evidence of any benefit for male to male transmission, which -- along with shared needles among intravenous drug users -- is still the most common modality of transmission in the United States.

"Pediatricians must embrace their oath to do no harm and recognize that the baby -- not the parent -- is their patient," said Georganne Chapin, who heads Intact America, the clearinghouse for information on the anti-circumcision movement. "There is no justification to recommend unnecessary surgery to remove healthy, functioning tissue from a baby boy on the chance he might engage in unsafe sexual behavior decades into the future."

The United States is the only western nation that still circumcises a majority of its baby boys for non-religious reasons. The circumcision rate in most European countries is less than five percent. Even here, the rate has dropped from around 90 percent thirty years ago to below 60 percent today, in part because of large immigration influxes from Latin America, the Caribbean and Asia, parts of the world where circumcision is rare. But the drop is also due to growing awareness among medical professionals and expectant parents that there is no medical reason to subject newborn boys to risky, unnecessary surgery that removes healthy, functional tissue.

"European countries have far lower rates of circumcision and far lower HIV rates, which underscore the lack of any link between the surgery and the disease," said Chapin. "In this country, there is similarly no link between circumcision and HIV based on geography, ethnic group or any other demographic subgroup."

"Preventing HIV requires use of a condom or other safe sexual practice," Chapin said. "Circumcision does not prevent HIV."

The AAP circumcision review task force is headed by Dr. Susan Blank, an Assistant New York City Health Commissioner in charge of the Bureau of Sexually Transmitted Diseases Prevention and Control. Chapin said Dr. Blank, who has made public comments in support of circumcision, must ensure the AAP considers all factors involved in an honest and open assessment, including underreported but very real risks to the baby including bleeding, surgical error, infection and, in several cases reported recently, even deaths.

Currently, no respected medical authority in the world recommends neonatal male circumcision -- not the AAP, CDC or the American Medical Association, which calls the surgery "non-therapeutic." The Royal Australian Academy of Pediatrics recently revisited its stance, and found that any benefits "do not warrant a recommendation of universal circumcision for newborn and infant males."

Circumcision also adds more than $1 billion in annual health care costs to taxpayers and families, and $1 billion in income to doctors.

For more information, please go to Intact America's website at www.intactamerica.org.

SOURCE Intact America

Bob Liff of M+R Strategic Services, Inc., (O) +1-917-438-4628 or (c ) +1-917-287-7089 bliff@mrss.com, for Intact America ©

Link: Intact America Urges Pediatricians to Say No to Infant Circumcision - The Baby, Not The Parent, Is Your Patient

ICGI PRESS RELEASE: Pediatricians at AAP National Conference Picketed by Intactivists

Intactivists will be protesting what they believe to be an unethical and sexist practice—infant circumcision—at the American Academy of Pediatrics National Conference and Exhibition (AAP NCE, 2009), Washington Convention Center, Washington, DC, October 17-20.

Washington, DC (PRWEB) October 14, 2009 -- Intactivists will be protesting what they believe to be an unethical and sexist practice—infant circumcision—at the American Academy of Pediatrics National Conference and Exhibition (AAP NCE, 2009), Washington Convention Center, Washington, DC, October 17-20.

This year’s AAP convention theme is “Pediatric Heroes: Champions for Children.’ Intactivist Dan Strandjord, Chicago, says, “Cutting off the end of a boy’s penis is not what a medical “hero” should do. It is a "villainous" practice, there is no medical reason for it. A real super hero would have the courage to “put down their scalpel” and force other doctors to do the same.”

Demonstrators will be carrying placards satirizing the conference’s cartoon characters of pediatricians as flying super-heroes. It depicts a super-hero protecting a baby boy with the comment: “Real heroes don’t cut babies.”

Girls are protected from genital cutting, even a pinprick, by federal law, but boys have no protection.

Circumcision is a multi-million dollar income stream for doctors, a source of revenue that is almost doubled in order to repair poorly performed circumcisions.

No medical association in the world, including the AAP, recommends infant circumcision yet the barbaric practice continues.

Originally ‘invented’ by doctors in the late 19th century to control masturbation, the practice has become medicalized without ever passing scientific review.

###

NOTE: I've been informed that this post's original title mistakenly identified Intact America as the source of this press release. That is not the case. My apologies. Again, Intact America is NOT behind this press release and had nothing to do with its dissemination. ICGI issued it.

PRWEB Link: Pediatricians at AAP National Conference Picketed by Intactivists