Home About Chat Users Issues Party Candidates Polling Firms Media News Polls Calendar Key Races United States President Senate House Governors International

New User Account
"A comprehensive, collaborative elections resource." 
Email: Password:

  Is circumcision good for your health?
NEWS DETAILS
Parent(s) Issue 
ContributorPenguin 
Last EditedPenguin  Oct 05, 2011 08:15pm
Logged 1 [Older]
CategoryGeneral
News DateThursday, October 6, 2011 02:00:00 AM UTC0:0
DescriptionWhere are the foreskins of yesteryear? Circumcision was once a routine procedure for infant boys in America, but in recent years it’s fallen out of favor. A CDC report last month noted that “in-hospital circumcisions dropped from 62.5% in 1999 to 56.9% in 2008.” Eighteen states have dropped Medicare funding for the procedure, and earlier this year, lobbyists in San Francisco attempted a ballot initiative to ban circumcisions outright.

But now the pro-circumcision side is coming back swinging. In an editorial in the October 5 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association, doctors Aaron A. R. Tobain and Ronald H. Gray enthusiastically endorse “The Medical Benefits of Male Circumcision.” In it, they state that “three randomized trials in Africa demonstrated that adult male circumcision decreases human immunodeficiency virus acquisition in men by 50 percent to 60 percent” and that “male circumcision has been shown to reduce the risk of other heterosexually acquired sexually transmitted infections,” including herpes and HPV. Further, the authors argue that infant circumcision can prevent “infant urinary tract infections, meatitis, balanitis, and phimosis.” And the authors cleverly compare circumcision to vaccination, arguing that it’s “in the best interests of children” and positing that “If a vaccine were available that reduced HIV risk by 60 percent, genital herpes risk by 30 percent, and HR-HPV risk by 35 percent… it would be promoted as a game-changing public health intervention.”

But is it? As a commenter at the L.A. Times noted Wednesday, “Europe and Japan have low circumcision rates and low HIV rates,” and a 2004 Naval Health Research Center concluded, “Although there may be other medical or cultural reasons for male circumcision, it is not associated with HIV or STI prevention in this U. S. military population.”
Share
ArticleRead Full Article

NEWS
Date Category Headline Article Contributor

DISCUSSION