The LA Times today had a long article on the benefits of circumcision, which was done to 85% of newborn American boys in 1965, but is now performed only on 56% (75% in the Midwest, 65% in the Northeast, 56% in the South and 31% in the West, which has a large percentage of Hispanic immigrants, who have little cultural familiarity with circumcision). Health issues. In the first year of life, 1% of uncircumcised boys will get a urinary tract infection, versus 1 in 1,000 circumcised boys. Inability to retract the foreskin (phimosis) occurs in 4% of uncut boys, according to the article, and half are later circumcised. Penile cancer occurs in 1 of every 100,000 men, but it is three times more likely in uncut men. Except for phimosis, none of these health issues would alone seem to justify circumcision. (See discussion of AIDS later). The American Academy of Pediatrics policy on circumcision states: "Existing scientific evidence demonstrates potential medical benefits of newborn male circumcision; however, these data are not sufficient to recommend routine neonatal circumcision". It advises parents to do what is in the best interests of the child, and adds that it is legitimate to take family cultural, religious and ethnic traditions into account when deciding. The American Urological Association has a very similar policy. However, both the AAP and the AUA, as well as the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) are reevaluating their positions based on three randomized controlled studies conducted on over 10,000 men in South Africa, Uganda and Kenya over the past several years, which found that circumcised male adults are 51% to 60% less likely to acquire HIV from heterosexual vaginal sex with an infected woman. However, the HIV epidemic is much higher in Africa, and the primary mode of HIV infection there is through male-to-female sex, not male-to-male sex, as it is in the U.S. The CDC's early opinion, subject to further analysis, is that "given all previous data on circumcision plus the recent HIV African studies, the medical benefits of male infant circumcision outweigh the risks." The AAP formed a task force in 2007 to study its current guidelines on circumcision in light of the new data. Isn't an uncircumcised penis more sensitive than a circumcised one? A UCLA professor of Urology, Dr. Christopher Saigal, says that this belief is not well supported in the literature. A recent controlled study published in the January, 2008 issue of BJU International, the British Journal of Urology, looked at nearly 4,500 Ugandan men, ages 15-49, who were all sexually experienced. Researchers randomly selected half of the males to undergo immediate circumcision, and half to have a circumcision in 24 months. They compared the two groups at 6, 12 and 24 months to measure sexual satisfaction and performance. The study found that the circumcised group's rate of sexual satisfaction remained constant, with 98.5% reporting sexual satisfaction before circumcision,, and 98.4% reporting satisfaction two years after the procedure was done. Comments are welcome.
a medical study of this nature done in third-world countries would hardly seem to be applicable in a western nation.
I have no problem with circumcision, but I think it should be a crime to circumcise babies who can't give consent.
Pansy - That is why the American medical groups are evaluating the results closely. In Africa, the AIDS problem is largely a heterosexual one, while in the U.S. it is largely a homosexual problem. But because it is such an epidemic in Africa, the medical team could justify playing with people's lives and randomly circumcising half the study popuulation and not the other half, and seeing how they do after receiving the same sex instruction re condoms, preventing AIDS and STDs. However, after getting the results from 10,000 participants, they decided that the results were conclusive enough to stop playing with their lives, since the result could be life or death. Such a study could never have been done in a "western nation", but because the problem is so huge in Africa, radical measures are justified, and the authorities may ultimately find that the results also apply to "western nations". The recent New Zealand study done over 25 years is very authoritative, and was done in a "western nation". It found that there was a better than 50% greater chance of getting an STD for an uncut guy.
it seems somewhat circular reasoning here...of course if there's less tissue to get infected there will be less infected tissue. but we don't cut cut our tongues out because it reduces cases of tongue cancer (which it surely would). i haven't read of any studies that control for the hygiene factor, and i'm wary of 'research' that has a hidden agenda from the outset. it would be too easy to skew the results of a correlational study.
Crueluserboy: You are talking dumb. The New Zealand study over 25 years had the large study population report back periodically over that period and tell the researchers about their sexual experiences and incidence of STDs. Uncut guys had a 50% greater incidence of STDs over that period. New Zealanders are predominantly white (and 10% Maori, the native people), and the rate of circumcision has been about equal to those uncut over the years, so the test population is not distorted by class or income levels, or by the chance that the uncut population might use condoms less. Check out the study yourself, by Googling "circumcision and New Zealand". I have been to New Zealand, and it is a great country, with a happy, outdoors-oriented people in a prosperous environment. How is this 50% greater incidence explained? It is due to the fact that when an uncut guy engages in unprotected sex, after he withdraws and his penis goes soft, the foreskin recovers the glans and traps STDs under the foreskin, where they stay alive in the moist environment and enter the body through the sensitive cells on the underside of the foreskin. Cut guys, after withdrawal, have the STDs exposed to air, where they quickly die unless they enter the body through a cut or abrasion on the penis.
This is research sponsored by the U.S. government and international health organizations. They have no hidden agenda.
Hmm, I can see how certain bacteria like chlamydia or fungi like C.albicans could get trapped under the foreskin, but this doesn't hold for HIV. Any stats on that? HIv cannot survive outside the human body (i.e bloodstream, urethra or vagina) for more than 8 seconds. How is that long enough for it to get from the glans penis into the urethra? Plus, if you're wearing a condom, at no point is your penis in contact with the vagina, otherwise there wouldn't be a lot of point. So really I'm curious as to how uncut men can have a 50% greater chance of STDs, and which ones they are.
The virus, including HIV can enter the body through the underside of the foreskin, if the penis gets soft and the foreskin retracts inside the vagina. It does not enter the body through the urethra. If an uncut guy wears a condom, there is no issue here. According to the New Zealand study, uncut men who have unprotected sex have a 50% greater chance of getting an STD through the underside of the foreskin after it retracts back over the head after sexual intercourse. Cut guys don't have (most) of this foreskin, and the head remains exposed to the air after unprotected sex. Unless the cut guy has a sore or cut on his penis, the virus will not enter.
