NOCIRC-SA

Conference tells AAP, CDC: “Don’t cut babies”

July 31st, 2010 by ICGI

An international conference has delivered a clear message to US medical bodies not to recommend any infant genital cutting that is not strictly necessary, organizers say. The 11th International Symposium on Genital Integrity ended at the University of California at Berkeley this evening.

“We learned how circumcision does much more harm and less good than most people imagine,” co-organizer Marilyn Milos said, “and how circumcision instruments have particular risks—as we were reminded last week when a boy was awarded $10 million for a tragic botch.”

The American Academy of Pediatrics and the Centers for Disease Control are both considering revising their currently neutral advice about neonatal circumcision in the United States, following claims from trials in Africa that it reduced the rate of HIV transmission from women to men by 1.8%. Over three trials, the rates were 2.49% of non-circumcised men and 1.18% for circumcised men.

“We heard how the African trials are irrelevant to the US, where HIV is mainly transmitted by sharing IV drug needles and sex between men,” Milos said.

“The AAP should have learned from its recent experience with female cutting, that even a token nick is not acceptable, and male circumcision and intersex reassignment are much more extensive than a token nick,” Milos said.

Speakers came to the symposium from Australia, Brazil, Canada, Egypt, England, Ireland, Italy, and New Zealand.

Tomorrow the National Organization of Circumcision Information Resource Centers (NOCIRC), one of the conference organisers, marks 25 years in existence.

For more information, contact Marilyn Milos, RN, (415) 488-9883, or Georganne Chapin, (914) 806-3573.

Circumcision Rates Plummet in USA: 2 Out of 3 Boys Escape the Knife

August 14th, 2010 by ICGI

The US male infant circumcision rate is now 32%, according to the CDC. This is great news for Intactivists and even better news for the more than one million boys who are now remaining intact every year. This means that their efforts have been successful in continuing the steady decline of an unnecessary surgery upon defenseless infants.

The genital integrity community is astonished and happy that the US circumcision rate is now below one-third. Intactivists had been predicting that the 50/50 point wouldn’t occur until 2011 or 2012. This is a huge drop. And, social change can happen quickly. Circumcision has been in the news a lot lately, primarily from the efforts of Intact America.

Intactivists have responded variously to this news. Some are giddy and self-congratulatory, others question the “too good to be true” number, while others are ignoring it because it came from their opposition.

But most of the credit goes to parents who are learning more about circumcision before making the decision. What many are saying is that their decision wasn’t based on whether or not circumcision was beneficial or harmful, but that it is not their place to decide on elective surgery for their child. They figure that since it is his body, not theirs, that he can make the decision when he is older. By leaving him intact, they are leaving him with a choice, not living with an irreversible condition.

The statistic was released during a presentation at the AIDS 2010 conference in Vienna, Austria, late last month. Presenters were C. El Bcheraoui, K. Kretsinger, and R. Chen from the CDC, and J. Greenspan from SDI Health. The CDC hired SDI Health, one of the country’s largest health-care analysts, to do the research. They looked at 21% of hospital records for the last 4 years and found that the circumcision rate has continued to drop, from 56% in 2006, to 32.5% in 2009. SDI Health has worked with the CDC on previous studies. US circumcision rates peaked at about 85% in 1979.

Less than 1/10th of one percent of adult males opt for circumcision, indicating that circumcision has never been medically useful. But, with more boys remaining intact, they will later be at risk for circumcision from mis-diagnosis of penile conditions, and from doctors prescribing amputation to treat them instead of first trying less invasive treatments.

[Source]



Distributors reject call to stop using circumcision clamp

09 Jul 2010
Sapa

CAPE TOWN — The southern African distributors of the Tara KLamp circumcision device have rejected a call for it to be put on hold until safety concerns have been addressed.

The call was made yesterday in a joint statement by the Treatment Action Campaign and the Southern African HIV Clinicians’ Society.

Tony Lawrence, spokesperson for distributors Carpe Diem Enterprises, said, however, that the statement contains numerous allegations about the clamp which are “totally inaccurate, unjustified and unfounded”.

“We are determined to correct the views of all the parties concerned, as the experiences of our medical doctors across the country can attest to the efficacy and ease of use of the [clamp].”

He promised a full response later.

TAC and the doctors said they encourage voluntary male circumcision as a way of reducing the risk of heterosexual men contracting HIV and the human papilloma virus.

In a controlled trial of the Tara KLamp at Orange Farm in Gauteng, circumcised men using the clamp reported worse pain than men using the forceps-guided method of medical circumcision.

That trial was stopped early due to the unacceptably high rate of adverse events, and the researchers have “strongly” cautioned against using the clamp on young adults.

The clamp is attached to the foreskin, and after about a week the device, along with the foreskin, usually falls off. But in some cases the device does not fall off, forcing the patient to have it removed surgically.

“Currently, the balance of evidence shows that the [clamp] is unsafe for use on adolescents and adults,” TAC and the doctors said.

“The [clamp] must be withdrawn from sale and distribution for adolescent and adult circumcision throughout sub-Saharan Africa, until the device’s safety concerns are addressed.”

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