Male Circumcision: Should It Now Be A Crime?

Male Circumcision: Should It Now Be A Crime?


click on link above for whole story

Male circumcision is without doubt one of the more controversial issues along with abortion within the cultures within the United States. There are ethical, legal, medical, cultural and religious as well as, I presume, political aspects to the issue. This topic was brought up on my blog posting "I Hate Doctors" but I felt it was an important topic to be discussed on a posting more specific to the circumcision issue. Other constructive discussions of "hateful" concerns and experiences about physician behavior can continue to be discussed there but I would like circumcision issues discussed here. I would also appreciate comments and arguments here from those visitors who see some good or value in circumcision or would find defects, legal or ethical, in the law requested below. ..Maurice.



The MGMBill.org, is attempting to get a bill passed in Congress to make male genital circumcision a crime in addition to what many feel to be mutilation acts on females. Below is the proposed congressional bill which the group hopes will become law. According to their website, "the MGM Bill proposal has been submitted to every member of Congress three times: on February 23, 2004, February 28, 2005, and February 6, 2006. In 2006, our state offices also submitted state level MGM Bill proposals to every member in 15 U.S. state legislatures."

Genital Mutilation Prohibition Act

IN THE HOUSE AND SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES

this persons view on circumcision

i found this vid

Thoughts on Circumcision

more youtube vids

more utube vids

utube vids

some links i found on circumcision

here are some links


http://www.4-men.org/circumcision/foreskin.html

http://www.patentstorm.us/patents/7080984-description.html

http://rebirthofreason.com/Forum/GeneralForum/0714.shtml

http://gaymart.com/shopbook/2item/i009410.html

http://www.nocirc.org/publish/pamphlet7.html

http://www.experienceproject.com/uw.php?e=195070

http://www.dailymotion.com/painfulquestioning/video/x41icr_nonsurgical-foreskin-restoration_politics

http://www.americanpregnancy.org/labornbirth/circumcision.html

http://family.go.com/parentpedia/baby/care-basics/baby-circumcision-care/foreskin-or-no-foreskin-557883/

http://www.birthjourney.com/circumcision.php

http://www.4restore.com/media/MediaHighlights/Lycos%20Finance%20%20Growing%20Popularity%20of%20Foreskin%20Restoration%20Prompts%20Development%20of%20Non-Surgical%20Device%20from%204Restore_com.htm?symbols=PRNEWS:100&story=27633341

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E0CE4D81E38F937A2575BC0A963948260&sec=health&spon=&pagewanted=all

I found this post

http://slingnmom.blogspot.com/2008/05/another-look-at-circumcision.html



http://www.prweb.com/releases/2004/11/prweb180294.htm

Circumcision Not Cost-Effective Says Study

Circumcision increases health-care costs and decreases wellness. Insurance companies would be better off PAYING parents and doctors to NOT circumcise boys.

November 20, 2004 -- Circumcision increases health-care costs and decreases wellness according to a cost-utility analysis by Robert S. Van Howe, MD, MS, FAAP, Department of Pediatrics, Michigan State University College of Human Medicine, Marquette, Michigan, in the latest edition of Medical Decision Making journal.

"If neonatal circumcision was cost-free, pain-free, and had no immediate complications, it was still more costly than not circumcising," says Van Howe. "Neonatal circumcision is not good health policy, and support for it as a medical procedure cannot be justified financially or medically."

Over the past century, some doctors have said circumcision benefits the boy later in life and is therefore justifiable as a prophylactic procedure. According to the findings of this study that isn't true. Wellness decreases as a result and with that goes an increase in health-care related expenses.

Circumcision costs everyone since both Medicaid and Medicare cover infant circumcision and its complications later in life. Medicaid pays for 28% of all infant circumcisions in the United States. Thirteen states do not cover circumcision in their Medicaid programs.

The analysis is based on published data from multiple observational studies, comparing boys circumcised at birth and those not circumcised, using the Quality of Well-being Scale, a Markov analysis, the standard reference case, and a societal perspective. Neonatal circumcision increased incremental costs by $828.42 per patient and resulted in an incremental 15.30 well-years lost per 1000 males. The only ones to gain from this unnecessary and harmful surgery are the attending physicians and hospitals.

ICGI has created a task force to discuss calling for a nationwide moratorium on the routine circumcision of baby boys based on this article's conclusion, and other bioethical concerns.

No experiment or random control trial has ever proven any of the alleged benefits to routinely circumcising baby boys. Circumcision of girls is considered a human rights violation and is illegal in the United States. Prophylactic tonsillectomy is no longer practiced, but was equally popular as circumcision in the United States medical community.

Dr. Robert Van Howe may be contacted at 906-228-7454. Contact ICGI for his email address.

Watch this Video:
http://www.livevideo.com/video/2F1276DA3E38487D9CADE02A5D370762/aap-releases-circumcision-poli.aspx


After reviewing 40 years worth of medical studies, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) Task Force on Circumcision concluded that the "potential medical benefits of newborn male circumcision... are not sufficient to recommend routine neonatal circumcision." While this 1999 policy may be revised soon, it is still the current official recommendation for parents and doctors.

Here are some highlights from the report:

Role of Hygiene

"there is little evidence to affirm the association between circumcision status and optimum penile hygiene."

STDs including HIV

"behavioral factors appear to be far more important than circumcision status."

Penile Cancer

"in a developed country such as the United States, penile cancer is a rare disease and the risk of penile cancer developing in an uncircumcised man, although increased compared with a circumcised man, is low."

Urinary Tract Infections

"breastfeeding was shown to have a threefold protective effect on the incidence of UTI in a sample of uncircumcised infants. However, breastfeeding status has not been evaluated systematically in studies assessing UTI and circumcision status." meaning that the earlier UTIs studies results were confounded.

Even if their numbers were accurate, in order to prevent one UTI during the first year of life by circumcising a baby boy, approximately 195 babies who will not get a UTI would need to be circumcised. Also infant girls commonly develop UTIs(in some studies at even higher rates than infant boys) and the standard treatment for them is antibiotics which works just as well for infant boys with UTIs. The AAP concludes this section noting that "the absolute risk of developing a UTI in an uncircumcised male infant is low (at most, ~1%)".

Ethics

Of course here, they hedge and say while even though cutting off part of your baby's genitalia "is not essential to the child's current well-being" they are perfectly fine with parents and doctors using cultural tradition as justification. This report is also the first time the AAP has acknowledged(after decades of doctors mindlessly repeating the belief that babies don't feel significant pain) that circumcision without anesthesia is traumatic and if circumcision is to be done, anesthesia should be used.

I would like to know if the AAP thinks cultural tradition is an acceptable reason to cut off the clitoral hoods(biologically analogous to foreskin) of infant girls especially if it is done with anesthesia as is the case here: http://www.msplinks.com/MDFodHRwOi8vd3d3LnlvdXR1YmUuY29tL3dhdGNoP3Y9eFd2aTQ3NWNZWlk=
(the video is not particularly graphic as it was made by a mother who had her own clitoral hood cut off when she was a baby and she wants to continue the tradition)

If you want, you can read the full AAP policy here: http://www.msplinks.com/MDFodHRwOi8vd3d3LmNpcnAub3JnL2xpYnJhcnkvc3RhdGVtZW50cy9hYXAxOTk5Lw==