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Do the benefits of male circumcision outweigh the risks?

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Do the benefits of male circumcision outweigh the risks?

Circumcision has been in the world since as far back as fifth century Before Christ.

Present in ancient civilizations like Egypt, Judah, Syria, Greece, Ethiopia, Africa, Australia etc.

and still practiced till now, it is the removal through surgery of the penis’s outer layer covering

tissue. Over the many years people have practiced masturbation, there has been many reasons for

it like: it makes the male more attractive, it is a sign that a boy has become man, to reduce self-

abuse (masturbatory practices), proof of a higher social status, marking a race of people etc.,

including proven health/medical benefits which this paper will be focusing on. Opposers of

circumcision will argue infections, wrong healing, bleeding, bleeding etc. We will find that the

benefits which circumcision offers, is more than its risks of complications; risks that can all be

avoided if it is caried out properly.

Circumcision: Findings

Although tales of why circumcision came to be in the world has caused arguments and

disagreements starting from an Ankh-Mahn, a King in Egypt who was believed to be

circumcised to show his royal status, then Abraham and God’s covenant in the bible, continued

on till the Jews of the Bible whom as a result of the circumcision they received while in Egypt

continued the practice. Even Muslims practiced it, but when the child was getting to the age of

puberty. One fascinating thing is that it started in other parts of the world without provocation, in

Africa 5000 years back for tribal identification, attraction, show of reaching manhood and so on.

Many circumcised their children immediately or shortly after childbirth, some at puberty

Australians and the American Indian race also practiced it. Even some societies circumcised their

male before marriage. The practice that had gone on for years became adopted for reasons varied

by the different groups of people who practiced it.

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In recent times, a sizable portion of the world’s total population still practices the act. It’s

is not common in places like Scandinavia, and other far east and European countries but mostly

found in a large amount in Africa, Asia and some Middle east countries with Muslims, Canada

and in the United States. The possibility of a male getting circumcised is based on the individuals

age, race, nationality and/or social class. It was later pointed out the baby’s physician played a

major role in this decision as parents who asked for it specifically without advice were few and

their reasons were mostly religious, or because of culture and social beliefs. In essence if one had

a physician who believed in circumcision, chances were they would decide to go with

circumcising the baby.

In the U.S. and Canada, medical practitioners had adopted circumcision in the 19th

century and its popularity spread and eighty percent of American and forty percent of Canadian

babies were getting circumcised. At first the pediatrics of America’s academy (AAP) was against

it because the benefits at the time could not be proved and it caused a reduction in the practice to

60 percent in 1980, but later on they changed their stance to neither being against it or for it and

left the decision to their parents to make and as a result there was also a recorded rise in the

number of circumcised babies i.e., more than eighty percent of babies delivered in the military

hospitals were circumcised.

In newborns, medical tools such as a clamp or a device called Plastibell is used to specify

the area for the surgery and during the surgery anesthesia is rarely used. The clamp, Gomco or

Yellen consists of a cone made of metal ad the clamp past holds the outer tissue that is to be cut

off tightly. The tissue is cut away, the remaining part dies and falls with the cap ring. The baby is

tested and is ensured to be free from circumstances like, illness, prematurity, problem with the
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blood or any type of rash, abnormalities and so on. It usually takes approximately 1 week to heal

in babies and 4-6 in adult men.

A lot of study has gone into the research of the good of circumcision over the harm it can

cause. We will be looking at the highest rated benefits of the act and some of the harm it can

cause, see table 1. In the case of cancers, research done based on Jews and non-Jews have shown

that there was a higher occurrence of prostate cancer in non-Jews the in Jews. It was found that

for the Jews only two percent had prostate cancer which is a lot less than the twenty percent of

non-Jews. In a comparison between Israel and Sweden (rare occurrences of circumcision), Israel

was found to have the prostate cancer rate up to 2.3 times less than Sweden.

For cancer of the cervix, there has been debate on whether it is related to the

circumcision of the male. Hanley WS, made it known that only 1/10 of the occurrence of cervical

cancer in the women of Fiji was the case of the women of Indians. The Indians were majorly

uncircumcised and they all lived in the same islands. Also, the Jewish women had a lower rate of

the cancer. Research done on penis cancer also showed considerably high relation to
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uncircumcision in males. The rate of penile cancer happening to Jewish males who were

circumcised was so minute, it was worth looking into and talking about. Because of this, more

than 3 studies into this, which were carried out over a considerable amount of time, was found to

have discovered little to no occurrence of cancer in the penis in men who were circumcised. In

Asian uncircumcised men, penile cancer takes from ten percent to twenty percent of all serious

diseases. For the U.S. cancer of the penis is so low in occurrence, it is only one to two in every

hundred thousand and the disease only accounts for at most 1.5% of the serious male diseases.

For the infections like HIV, a study was conducted in 1994 to determine the relation of

uncircumcision to the infection. Eighteen studies out of twenty-six reported a strong relationship

backed up by statistics and ever since then, other studies carried out produced eleven other

reports from countries like Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda, Cote d’Ivoire and India. 8 of them reported

that there was a strong relationship between HIV and having foreskin. And even though a lot of

sexual activities and hygiene issues can increase the risk and relationship uncircumcision and the

infection has a significant amount of research proving that men who are circumcised get a lower

risk of contracting the infection.

The urinary tract getting infected is another ailment that has been found to be related to

circumcision in males. Hachey and Wiswell, carried out an analysis of various studies conducted

to look into this association in 1993 and discovered that babies who are uncircumcised were

more open to contracting the infection. A risk interval of a twelve-point zero ratio was the

conclusion of the analysis. It wasn’t only applicable to the younger but in adults too. Other areas

where circumcision has been discovered to be a hindrance are phimosis, pospthitis and balanitis.

Phimosis is when the prepuce opening is too small and hinders the foreskin from sliding back.

This alone can lead to the Urinary tract disease and balanitis. Circumcision, automatically
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eliminates the possibility of phimosis. Balanoposthitis, pospthitis, balanitis all refer to an

inflammation of the prepuce and glans as a result of the presence of bacteria causing secretions.

As theses infections can only occur when the foreskin is present, those who are circumcised have

nothing to fear from this.

Even for other diseases that can be transferred through sex like syphilis and chancroid,

men who are circumcised come up with slimmer chances of occurrence. Some studies have

shown that gonorrhea and anaerobes have a high chance of spread when the man is not

circumcised. Just genital warts and urethritis have associations to circumcision that has not been

proved.

Conclusion

Even the AAP says if there so many widely researched and confirmed benefits of circumcision,

then insurance should be able add it to some of the health procedures it covers. To conclude,

recent research.

A team of disease experts and health economists at Johns Hopkins warns that steadily

declining rates of U.S. infant male circumcision could add more than $4.4 billion in

avoidable health care costs if rates over the next decade drop to levels now seen in

Europe. (John Hopkins Medicine, 2012, Declining Rates of U.S. Infant Male

Circumcision Could Add Billions to Health Care Costs, Experts Warn).

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References

“Information Package on Male Circumcision and HIV Prevention’’ (ND)

https://www.who.int/hiv/pub/malecircumcision/infopack_en_3.pdf

Stephen Moses, Robert C Bailey, Allan R Ronald. (1998)

“Male circumcision: assessment of health benefits and risks”

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1758146/pdf/v074p00368.pdf

Ellen Warner, MD, Elliot Strashin, MD. (1981). “Benefits and risks of circumcision”

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1862490/pdf/canmedaj01354-0025.pdf

John Hopkins Medicine. (2012).“Declining Rates of U.S. Infant Male Circumcision Could Add

Billions to Health Care Costs, Experts Warn”

https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/news/media/releases/declining_rates_of_us_infant_male_circu

mcision_could_add_billions_to_health_care_costs_experts_warn

David St. John-Hunt. (1967). “Circumcision Of The Newborn: Is It Good Preventive

Medicine?”

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.5694/j.1326-5377.1967.tb20891.x

Gardner D. (1949).“The fate of the foreskin : A study of circumcision”

https://ci.nii.ac.jp/naid/10022078743/

R. A. Wilson. (1977). “Circumcism.”

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1879464/