Losing the "Circ for STD prevention" battle...

[Emmeline II]

Google brought up a number of recent articles that state that circ'd men have lower rates of STDs.

[eepster]

Check this thread http://www.mothering.com/discussions....php?t=1075686 It has what you need.

[Emmeline II]

I wish I knew about mothering before my son was born.

Thanks.

[Fellow Traveler]

Or this one: http://www.mothering.com/discussions....php?t=1078011

[Night_Nurse]

This is in no way scientific, but the men I've known in real life who have stated they had previous std's were all circumcised. The intact men I've known have never had std's. By "known" I mean in an intimate sense. I don't know exactly how my personal sample size translates into real world statistics, but it certainly does show that some circed men get std's while intact men do not.

[teale]

You MAY want to look this up, but I was talking to a girlfriend who said that in Africa, the reason why men who are not circumcized have more STD's is because no one wants to have sex with the circumsized men.

[glongley]

Besides arguing stats and studies, I always think its a good idea to reframe any argument about medical rationales for circ according to certain ethical criteria (see below). I have these three points memorized now, so I don't feel so at sea if a medical rationale argument comes up.

The following quote is from From: The Ethical Canary: Science, Society and the Human Spirit by Margaret Somerville. Toronto, 2000. Margaret Sommerville is a lawyer and bioethicist, and is the founding director of the Centre for Medicine, Ethics, and Law at McGill University, Montreal, Canada.

A lengthier extract from Sommerville's book including the following excerpt can be read at: http://www.cirp.org/library/ethics/somerville4/

Gillian

----------------QUOTE--------------
A medical-benefits or 'therapeutic' justification requires that:

1) overall the medical benefits sought outweigh the risks and harms of the procedure required to obtain them,
2) that this procedure is the only reasonable way to obtain these benefits, and
3) that these benefits are necessary to the well-being of the child.

None of these conditions is fulfilled for routine infant male circumcision

[Greg B]

Excellent point Glongley.

Two points I will add. First they always seem to report in the articles and summaries out of context statistics so it sounds way better than it actually is. Instead of the 50% reduction between the two groups if study subjects who do get AIDS during the study, they should be comparing their rates against the study population to be fair. Then the statistics are more like circ’d men had a 1.6% chance of contracting aids, while the normal men had a 3.4% chance. Or if you were circ’d you had an incidence of 16 men out of a 1,000, while normal men had an incidence of 34 men out of 1,000.

The other is that in the AIDS work, it seems to me that all they are showing is that it will take longer (ie more sexual events) to become infected. The rate may be down, but if you do it enough, you will still get it.

This means that circ is only making it a little less likesly to get AIDS. And they still are recommending that men will need to wear condoms like anyone else would, circ'd or not. This means that circ is really only protecting guys from failed condoms, so if your condom breaks, and you are circ'd, you will be somewhat less likely to get AIDS.

So, to carry this through as Glongley pointed out, the choice is between:

1) Using a condom and retaining your foreskin thus enjoying much better sexual feeling and function for both partners (and arguably a much better likelyhood that men will use condoms because they feel so much better if you have a foreskin) but at a small increased risk of getting AIDS if you choose not to use a condom or your condom breaks on many occassions with AIDS positive partner(s)

vs

2) Using a condom but losing your foreskin along with a great deal of sexual function and feelings for both partners (and arguably much greater reluctance to use a condom due to the lack of feelings) but a small reduction in risk of getting AIDS if you choose not to use a condom or your condom breaks on many occassions with AIDS positive partner(s)


Regards

[Papai]

Originally Posted by teale

You MAY want to look this up, but I was talking to a girlfriend who said that in Africa, the reason why men who are not circumcized have more STD's is because no one wants to have sex with the circumsized men.

That hardly seems accurate since the vast majority of African men are circumcised and intact men are the minority. I think it's like 60 circ'd/40 intact ratio. Or maybe 70/30.

[erin23kate]

Having your breasts removed nearly eliminates the risk of breast cancer. Should we all chop our boobies off?

Removing men's penises altogether eliminates the risk of penile cancer. Should we remove penises at birth?

People get STDs from having unprotected, unsafe sex - not from having foreskins. Don't chop off your nose to spite your face!

[nd_deadhead]

It's simple:

Since babies are not sexually active, they are not at risk for STDs.

If a sexually active male believes that circumcision will protect him from STDs, he always has the option of getting himself circumcised. If the operation is too awful to consider for a teen/adult who has great faith int he medical benefits, perhaps it's too awful for an infant who has no understanding of what's happening to him, and no say in the matter.

[gstarnyc]

for the record....

I was cir'd as an infant...not to be too blunt but I've had every std in the book... All curable with antibiotics. Being circumcised didn't help...

[Seie]

So all boys should be circed and they wont have to protect themselfes later on. Brilliant. How is that for an excuse - no lady - I wont put on the raincoat - Im circed see!
Geez..

[2xy]

Both of my boys are intact, but if one of them were to come to me in a few years and say that he was planning on getting circumcised so he could avoid using condoms, I wouldn't think it to be a grand idea.

[Serenyd]

Originally Posted by 2xy

Both of my boys are intact, but if one of them were to come to me in a few years and say that he was planning on getting circumcised so he could avoid using condoms, I wouldn't think it to be a grand idea.

Ha! Good point!

[leila1213]

Subbing. These are such great arguments.

[orangewallflower]

Originally Posted by erin23kate

Having your breasts removed nearly eliminates the risk of breast cancer. Should we all chop our boobies off?

Removing men's penises altogether eliminates the risk of penile cancer. Should we remove penises at birth?

People get STDs from having unprotected, unsafe sex - not from having foreskins. Don't chop off your nose to spite your face!

My sentiments exactly. What if they found that removing labia reduced STD rate for girls? Would we DO that? No. Why? Because removing body parts is an insane way to prevent disease. Even if the statistics are accurate and it reduces the rate, my fondness for foreskin remains.

[eepster]

Originally Posted by orangewallflower

My sentiments exactly. What if they found that removing labia reduced STD rate for girls? Would we DO that? No. Why? Because removing body parts is an insane way to prevent disease. Even if the statistics are accurate and it reduces the rate, my fondness for foreskin remains.

There is some evidence that female circ does lower a woman chance of contracting HIV, but that research got dropped as soon as it started to not go the way the researchers wanted.