I would encourage you to read my book, a tale of childhood vulvectomy - clitordectomy, hoodectomy and labiectomy. WASP female in Kansas in the 1950s.
My story provides a very unflattering snapshot of the American medical system. And yet the insanity continues...
1) American doctors continue to routinely circumcise young males, even tho other English-speaking Christian countries stopped long ago - and for excellent reasons.
2) Americans insist on circumcising their sons then hypocritically scowl at Africans because they still circumcise girls.
Our medical system belongs to the "cut the foreskin off the baby" club with a football team mentality of anything 'our side' does - or wants to do - or can profit from - is promoted and defended?
Big people strap down little people and cut healthy parts off their bodies? This is not medicine. It is 'bullying', medical malpractice, improper professional behavior, child abuse, medical Munchausen syndrome - pretending something healthy and normal needs to be 'fixed' - oh, yes, and then sold - Red Cross - blood - now pristine human body tissues - they sell foreskins - Is that your interest in circumcision?
My book makes it clear that It is not only the chid's body that is harmed by circumcision. Look around you. PTSD is rife. Our country is in trouble. Look at our men. Look at the family structure. Listen to the music. Look at the nation and the world. We have a population that is violent at home, embroiled in wars abroad, yet our own country is in shambles, the Constitution in tatters.
Your title:
1) "Don't Be Scared to Circumcise Your Baby Boy" Would you have signed a consent form that said, "Don't Be Scared to Circumcise your baby girl"? “She won't feel a thing. She won't remember. She'll get over it!"
The practice of routine circumcision is not evidence-based. It is a mix of myth and superstition and old wives tales - with a healthy bit of financial profit thrown in for good measure - $70,000 for some OB/GYNs each year. How embarrassing it is to real science.
2) "It's not mutilation." Puhleeze consult your dictionary, Bernadine - it's mutilation.
3) And finally... "it should be the parents' choice." Really? Should the decision to cut healthy tissue off a baby be left to a layperson? Or is it a slick way to shift the blame to parents? "I had no choice - the parents insisted!" He who wields the scalpel is responsible.
I wonder, Bernadine, if you may have suffered the same fate as I. That may why you are passing on the abuse. It's a tendency for the abused to pass on abuse - until they heal their trauma. You might want to look at the symptoms of PTSD, read my book, and think about it. Call me if I can be of service.
And please - do what you can to clean up your profession. It seriously needs your help. A lot of doctors are coming clean and going straight these days. Join them.
Patricia Robinettof OR2:11AM July 08, 2010
Could there be some benefit to circumcision - perhaps but it is small if it exists at all.
Here is an argument you cannot dispute that you will not want to hear, but here goes:
Want a real health benefit? Why not recommend that females have their breasts removed after puberty. Breast cancer kills MANY women each year, even those who see a doctor regularly. Mastectomy is a 99% cure. According to the American Cancer Society, about 1.3 million women will be diagnosed with breast cancer annually worldwide about 465,000 will die from the disease.
On a purely objective review, mastectomy wins as the biggest benefit to society.
The bottom line, you do not proactively cut off body parts, especially when you cannot consult the person you are cutting them off of, your baby! And you do not remove woman's breasts even when you stand to save 465,000 lives!
John E.of AZ4:20PM July 07, 2010
Perhaps by 'minor surgery' they mean 'surgery on minors' :)
Anthony9:55AM June 06, 2010
It really should have this title:
"Don't be scared into circumcising your sons."
Until and unless we get scientifically credible evidence for benefits from circumcision that exceeds the proven harm, one should not be gullible enough to be scared into unnecessarily harming infant males by a medical industry that does not even know what constitutes credible scientific evidence .
And, after over 100 years of searching for them, we are still as far from having these as we have ever been.
"and in providing local anesthesia so that the child experiences no discomfort."
Bernadine is a doctor, and does not even know that even the best anesthesia does not eliminate PAIN (love her use of the term "discomfort--another attempt to minimize the procedure)?
"In summary, analgesia is safe and effective in REDUCING the procedural pain associated with circumcision " (emphasis added)
THE LANCET, Volume 349 Number 9052: Pages 599-603, March 1, 1997.
Meritcare (Internet) states that "Besides anesthesia, securing your child in the padded restraint chair and giving him a sugar-dipped pacifier can help reduce his level of stress (and yours). Used together, these methods can decrease discomfort by more than 50%."
None of the studied interventions completely eliminated the pain response to circumcision
This is only ONE of the aspects she is ignorant of... Sad to see this is the level of education of those in the American medical industry.
Robertof PA9:25AM January 26, 2010
"Done properly, the medical and personal risks are minimal, if any." Sure, done properly. But that begs the whole question that it WILL be done "properly", when it is often given to interns for training.
There is no standard for how much skin (muscle, nerves, arteries and veins) to remove, for example (there's no dotted line), and removing too much can result in painful erections years later, that may never be sheeted home to their real cause. The baby's penis is tiny, and any mistake is enlarged and distored like writing on a balloon when he grows up.
"I caution parents, however, against delaying the decision until the child is old enough to decide for himself. Get real. Not many teenage boys would relish the discussion, let alone the act. Nor do I think they would have the perspective to weigh the medical pros and cons." So let it wait until they can. Bernadine Healy is right, very, very few adult men choose to get circumcised - an excellent reason for not imposing it on babies. As someone said, "minor surgery is surgery that is done on someone else."
Yes, FGC is (usually) physically worse than MGC. That doesn't make MGC the slightest bit better ethically.
Nowhere does Bernadine Healy assign any value to having intact genitalia, either for the erogenous and protective functions of the foreskin, or for the state of integrity and autonomy they imply. Some men feel violated that this genital reduction was made before they could object (indeed, they objected as best they could at the time) and that feeling is perfectly valid.
Hugh74:09PM January 23, 2010
"What is not healthy in this free flow of ideas is to diminish the real abuse of female genital mutilation with a trumped-up portrayal of the "abuse" that infant circumcision allegedly exacts on our helpless baby boys."
Is subcision and Yemen male circumcision somehow NOT "real" abuse?
IF not, Pray tell why not, since both of these are more drastic than any form of FGM?
I am sorry, but mentioning the modern politically correct, cherry-picked mantra about FGM and then trying to distance it from MGM is nothing but hypocrisy or ignorance.
Robertof PA4:52PM January 22, 2010
I just noticed this point:
"It's not mutilation; it should be the parents' choice:
Have you looked up the definition of "mutilation"?..circumcision fits the definition!
I am curious, HOW & WHY it should be a parents' choice to cause PROVEN permanent and significant harm with PROVEN risks when there are not any PROVEN benefits to outweigh these?
Do you have a rational ethical justification for infant circumcision?
Since you seem to believe so, could you provide an answer?
Robertof PA4:46PM January 22, 2010
""Does male circumcision bring enough medical benefit to justify risk?" Done properly, the medical and personal risks are minimal, if any."
For someone advocating doing their research, it seems you do not follow your own advice.
DEATH is hardly minimal--yet an estimated 230 of them occur every year directly or indirectly from circumcision..
And for the other risks, here are a few more:
Complication rates..
and the lies of the AAP.
Even if these rates were only 1/10 of what they are, cumulatively they would far exceed the ridiculous numbers claimed by the AAP.
1. iatrogenic Phimosis 2.9%
2. Adhesions 71%
3. Meatal ulcers 31%
3. Meatal stenosis 8%
4. infection up to 10%
5. Bleeding <35%
1. JOURNAL OF UROLOGY, Volume 169, Number 6: Pages 2332-2334,
June 2003.
Outpatient Management of Phimosis Following Newborn Circumcision.
H. Jason Blalock, Vijaya Vemulakonda, Michael L. Ritchey, Michaelene Ribbeck
2. JOURNAL OF UROLOGY; Volume 164 Number 2: Pages 495-496, August 2000.
Penile adhesions after neonatal circumcision.
Ponsky LE, Ross JH, Knipper N, Kay R
3. CANADIAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION JOURNAL, Volume 95: Pages 576-581,
September 10, 1966.
The Problem of Routine Circumcision
http://www.emedicine.com/ped/topic2356.htm
4. BRITISH JOURNAL OF SURGERY, Volume 80, 1231-1236, October 1993.
Williams % Kapila
HAWA PATEL, M.B., Ch.B. (Cape Town), D.C.H., M.R.C.P.(E),*
Kingston, Ont.
5. BRITISH JOURNAL OF SURGERY, Volume 80, 1231-1236, October 1993.
Williams % Kapila
HAWA PATEL, M.B., Ch.B. (Cape Town), D.C.H., M.R.C.P.(E),*
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Patricia Robinett of OR 2:11AM July 08, 2010
John E. of AZ 4:20PM July 07, 2010
Anthony 9:55AM June 06, 2010
Robert of PA 9:52AM January 30, 2010
Robert of PA 11:50AM January 26, 2010
Robert of PA 9:25AM January 26, 2010
Hugh7 4:09PM January 23, 2010
Robert of PA 4:52PM January 22, 2010
Robert of PA 4:46PM January 22, 2010
Robert of PA 4:41PM January 22, 2010