Does Circumcision Reduce HIV Contraction?
March 31, 2008
In March 2007 the WHO and the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) stated that male circumcision is an effective intervention for HIV prevention, but also stated that male circumcision only provides partial protection and should not replace other interventions to prevent the hete rosexual transmission of HIV. Click to read article.
Circumcision is the removal of some or the entire foreskin [prepuce] from the penis. Moreover, male circumcision is a religious commandment in Islam and Christianity and is most common in the Caribbean, United States of America, Canada, Middle East, Africa and Asia. Circumcision has been advocated for many reasons; religious beliefs, cultural reasons among ethnic groups, hygiene and therapeutic purposes as the cure for phimosis, a condition where the male foreskin cannot be fully retracted from the head of the penis
The World Health Organization (WHO) stated that studies of three trials, one of which was completed, provide compelling evidence that male circumcision provides a 50-60% reduction in HIV transmission from female to male. In 2007, the WHO and UNAIDS recommended that male circumcision should now be recognized as an efficacious intervention for HIV prevention, but emphasised that it does not provide complete protection against HIV infection. Thus, Uncircumcised men are at greater risk of human papilloma virus infection and penile cancer are higher in uncircumcised male that those who are circumcised.
Several studies have shown that uncircumcised men are at greater risk of human papilloma virus (HPV) infection.One study found no statistically significant difference in the incidence of HPV infection between circumcised and uncircumcised men.
The surface epithelium of the gland develops a protective keratin layer- a form of natural condom. Thus, circumcision could reduce the HIV incidence by directly decreasing the susceptibility of infected men to HIV.
Circumcision could also reduce the incidence of HIV by directly decreasing the infectivity of men with HIV as suggested by the studies of tissue samples collected from macaques infected with the simian immune deficiency virus [SIV], which showed infected mononuclear cells in the dermis and epidermis of the penile foreskin.
Sexually transmitted disease [STD] may increase men’s susceptibility to HIV. If circumcision reduces the transmission of genital infections, either by improving local hygiene or by accelerating the healing of otherwise subpreputial lesions, circumcision may also delay HIV transmission. Therefore, potential associations between the lack of circumcision and STD and HIV are also of interests.
Researchers have documented that male circumcision significantly reduces the risk of HIV acquisition by men during penile- vaginal sex.
The culture of circumcision is a rite of passage in males that took place either shortly after birth, during childhood or puberty. However, no valid evidence to date supports the idea that being circumcised affects sexual satisfaction or sensation.
What do you think about male circumcision relative to HIV?
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8 Responses to “Does Circumcision Reduce HIV Contraction?”
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Male circumcision is *NOT* a religious commandment in Christianity. The USA and the Philippines are the only countries where Christians circumcise. The practice was introduced into the Philippines around the time of the second world war. In the most Christian countries in the world, circumcision is almost non-existent.
For Catholics, circumcision is actually a sin: http://www.catholicsagainstcircumcision.org
The effects of male circumcision on sexual satisfaction are very controversial:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_effects_of_circumcision
Most studies showing no difference in sensitivity measure the sensitivity of the glans only, and not the inner foreskin, which is in fact the most sensitive part.
Circumcision can only possibly help men who have unsafe sex with HIV+ partners, so why this bizarre obsession with genital surgery when we know that ABC works better than circumcision ever could? (ABC=Abstinence, Being Faithful, Condoms).
The studies which allegedly show a reduction in HIV among circumcised men are highly questionable. Not one of them was finished, despite the protective affect appearing to decline well below the oft-reported 65%, and several of the subjects disappeared. The fact that one study described circumcision as “comparable to a vaccine of high efficacy” seems to show clear bias. They appear to have been seeking a certain result.
The two continents with the highest rates of AIDS are the same two continents with the highest rates of male circumcision. Rwanda has almost double the rate of HIV in circed men than intact men, yet they’ve just started a nationwide circumcision campaign. Something is very wrong here. These people aren’t interested in fighting HIV, but in promoting circumcision (or sometimes, anything but condoms), and their actions will cost lives rather than saving them.
Female circumcision seems to protect against HIV too btw, but we wouldn’t investigate cutting off women’s labia, and then start promoting that.
Circumcised male virgins are more likely to be HIV+ than intact male virgins, as the operation sometimes infects men. The latest news is that circumcised HIV+ men are more likely to transmit the virus to women than intact HIV+ men (even after the healing period is over). Eight additional women appear to have been infected during that study, solely because their husbands were circumcised.
http://www.doctorsopposingcircumcision.org/info/HIVStatement.html
Please don’t be confused. Circumcision is NOT part of Christinaity:
Read Romans 2:29, Romans 3:30, Acts 15:10, I Corinthians 7:18, Galatians 5:6, Galatians 5:2, Galatians 6:15, Philippians 3:2, Colossians 2:12, Matthew 9:12
Also, there is certainly valid evidence that circumcision affects sexual experience. See sensitivity studies like
http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1464-410X.2006.06685.x
and satisfaction studies like
http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1464-410X.2006.06646.x
and there can be no mistaking that circumcision amputates thousands of specialized pleasure-receptive nerve endings and eliminates the mechanical advantages of the slack skin tube; lubrication, protection for the glans and mucosa, and additional plush girth.
No discussion of circumcision and HIV should overlook the fact that most of the US men who have died of AIDS were circumcised at birth.
You seem to have cut and pasted lines from a lot of different items together with no measure of their quality. Some contradict each other.
Circumcision is certainly NOT a commandment of Christianity, in fact Galatians 5 2 says “.. if you become circumcised, Christ will profit you nothing”.
Circumcision is not at all common in the Caribbean or Asia, and becoming quite rare in Canada.
The most recent study of STDs, from New Zealand, found NO connection between circumcision and STDs.
The studies showing connections between intactness and HIV or HPV have quite glaring flaws. (Several times more circumcised men dropped out of the HIV trials than the number of intact men who got HIV. The main HPV study compared people from different countries - the circumcised men were almost all in the Philippines, where anything else could account for the low HPV rate.)
The penile cancer rate is higher in the circumcising US than non-circumcising Denmark.
The study of Sorrells et al. shows (what every intact man knows) that circumcision cuts off the most sensitive part of the penis.
And so on. You’ll find a more coherent account at http://www.circumstitions.com .
I don’t see how foreskin will help reduce the contraction of HIV when the methods of catching the virus have not changed.
Jesus Christ, Abraham and Mohammad was circumcised. Believers choose to follow from their religious text/cultures.If Jesus Christ was circumcised why is it a sin?
Genesis 17 Verses 9-14
9 Then God said to Abraham, “As for you, you must keep my covenant, you and your descendants after you for the generations to come. 10 This is my covenant with you and your descendants after you, the covenant you are to keep: Every male among you shall be circumcised. 11 You are to undergo circumcision, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and you. 12 For the generations to come every male among you who is eight days old must be circumcised, including those born in your household or bought with money from a foreigner—those who are not your offspring. 13 Whether born in your household or bought with your money, they must be circumcised. My covenant in your flesh is to be an everlasting covenant. 14 Any uncircumcised male, who has not been circumcised in the flesh, will be cut off from his people; he has broken my covenant.”
Mark Lyndon and Ron Low..
Can you guys decipher the above verses for me?
The following link provide some must read info on circumsion?
http://www.netdoctor.co.uk/menshealth/facts/circumcision.htm