yikes

[dynamohumm6]

What's up with this???
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8473838/

Report: Male circumcision cuts AIDS risk
Study conducted on over 3,000 HIV-negative men, newspaper says

Male circumcision reduces the risk that men will contract HIV through intercourse with infected women by about 70 percent, according to a study reported in The Wall Street Journal.

After discovering the dramatic results, French and South African researchers halted the study about nine months in order to offer the uncircumcised men the opportunity to undergo the procedure, the newspaper reported.

The results of the study have not been published in a medical journal, although the French researcher who headed the team is expected to present them at an International AIDS Society conference in Brazil later this month.

The study was conducted on more than 3,000 HIV-negative South African men, ages 18 to 24. Half of the men were randomly selected to be circumcised while the other half remained uncircumcised.

After following the men for a year, the researchers found that for every 10 uncircumcised men in the study who became infected with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, only an estimated three circumcised men contracted the virus, the newspaper reported.

The study is considered significant because scientists have yet to discover an effective vaccine against the HIV virus or develop a reliable way to prevent infection other than through abstinence or safe-sex practices.

Previous studies have linked circumcision with increased HIV infection.

I'm sure this is flawed, and doesn't change my opinion one iota, but thoughts?

[veiledexpressions]

Someone posted this on a mainstream debate board that I frequent. Several of the intactivists were quick to point out that instead of cutting baby boys, we should be teaching our children about safe sex and condoms.

[Daisyuk]

Doesn't seem to have done a lot for the US rate of AIDS though does it?

You're 4th highest adult infection rate in the world. There must be a confounding factor at work somewhere.

http://www.avert.org/worldstats.htm

http://www.niaid.nih.gov/vrc/clintri...statistics.htm

" MC will not be a "magic bullet." As will likely be true for future microbicides or AIDS vaccines, circumcision will not provide full protection against HIV. It will provide little or no protection against urethral STDs such as gonorrhea and chlamydia and obviously will not prevent unwanted pregnancies. Effective behavior change programs will still be needed to address these risks. There will also be an urgent need to address possible behavioral "disinhibition" among circumcised men who may continue or return to high-risk behaviors if they feel they are protected by MC, when in fact such protection is partial, not 100 percent. Counseling that addresses informed choice and consent; the HIV prevention "ABC" behaviors of abstinence/delay of sexual debut, being faithful/partner reduction, and condom use; and other male reproductive health needs (such as STD treatment, family planning, and gender-based violence) would therefore need to be part of any future MC services."

And guess what, so unbiased:
"Large clinical trials to confirm an association between MC and HIV risk are now underway."

In other words, circumcision won't make a blind bit of difference, we still have to educate and do all that stuff with condoms, but we're going to get them to do it anyway, and we'll make sure the study proves it's beneficial...I think the US obsession with genital cutting is just sickening.

http://www.usaid.gov/our_work/global...factsheet.html


The British point of view:
http://adc.bmjjournals.com/cgi/content/full/77/3/194

Personally I'd rather a child kept all his penis, and was taught to use a condom.

[MCatLvrMom2A&X]

It has to be flawed
1) how do they know that all the men had intercourse with a infected partner
2) Do they know how many of each group had intercourse with anyone at all?
3) How many actually wore a condom? (the only way to really prevent HIV infection) with intercourse.

For this to be a acurate study all of the men would have to have intercourse with a HIV infected partner and all would have had to do so without the use of a condom.

Reports like this make me sick cause they appear to be so biased. :Puke

[Daisyuk]

And not only that, but looking up the news articles in other places that this has been reported shows that not only has it not been published anywhere yet, and thus not peer reviewed, but it was actually turned down for publication in The Lancet.

http://rawstory.com/news/2005/Claim_...ty_p_0705.html

I wonder why they chose to release this to the media with absolutely nothing whatever to back it up in the way of verifiable data?

It couldn't be that Italian scientists are close to getting a vaccine breakthrough and thus rendering all the circ. research unnecessary could it?
http://today.reuters.co.uk/news/news...VACCINE-DC.XML

or am I getting a bit too cynical?

[dynamohumm6]

All the thoughts I had circulating in my head were just put into words by all of you--thank you!

[Frankly Speaking]

The public media releases of these "studies' are fairly common but the actual release and publication for peer critical review is quite rare. I suspect that they will not withstand critical review.

I'm not sure if this is the same one but there was one publicized in the media a few months ago that sounds identical. They offered free circumcisions to the men and found that after the circumcision, the men were engaging in more risky sexual behavior than before the circumcision and thus were contracting AIDS at a far higher rate. However, their conclusion was the same . . . That circumcision was an effective intervention in the spread of AIDS and as a result, offered free circumcisions to the men who had not recieved them.

These media press releases are high on sensationalism and very short on details. For instance, they didn't tell how many men had actuall contracted AIDS supposedly because they were circumcised. If there were 7 out of 1,000 that contracted AIDS presumably because they were not circumcised, that would be statistically insignificant and well within the bounds of confounding factors. Of course, 7 out of 1,000 men getting AIDS would not make for much of a press release so they simply restate their claims to make it more dramatic by saying that it is 70% which is technically correct but misleading in the extreme.

If male circumcision were such a wonderful barrier against AIDS, the US would not have the highest infection rate among all industrialized nations of the world. So far, no one has been able to explain that away since the US is the highest percentage of circumcised males in the industrialized world and that factor is a constant thorn in their side. If it were true, AIDS would not gained much of a foothold in the US because of that 70% advantage.

A sad fact is that 80% of all females infected by AIDS are African American, infected by circumcised African American males. Is race a factor in this? I'm sure that many of these researchers would contend it is not so but instead because there are a few uncircumcised African American males that are spreading the infection around to them. Nope, that doesn't work either. Neither race or circumcision is a factor.



Frank

[Daisyuk]

Bumpity bump

[Minky]

I don't think this study was meant to be applied to the U.S.

[eightyferrettoes]

Originally Posted by Minky

I don't think this study was meant to be applied to the U.S.

No? Then who should it apply to? Do American men have somehow biologically different penises than men in South Africa?

[Minky]

I thought most men in the US were getting infected either through receptive anal sex or intravenous drug use and that insertive sex was considered lower risk. Whether thats cos the majority of US men are circed I do not know.

I dont think it would help significantly in the US because people are getting infected thru other means but if it helps in Africa I dont know what to think.

I dont think it makes it right to forcibly circumcise anyone no. But if men who were unwilling to have safe sex used it as an option why not?

[eightyferrettoes]

But doesn't it tell you something that the U.S-- who has by far the highest circ rate in the "first world" also has the highest AIDS/HIV rate?

I'm certainly not against grown men doing whatever stupid modifications to their bodies that they so desire. Hell, if my grown son wants to run piercings up the length of his genitals, far be it from me to stop him. (Just don't call and tell me about it, OK?)

But what grown man would voluntarily part with his foreskin in lieu of using a freakin' condom? Would you sacrifice your clitoral hood? I wouldn't!

[paquerette]

Originally Posted by Minky

I thought most men in the US were getting infected either through receptive anal sex or intravenous drug use and that insertive sex was considered lower risk. Whether thats cos the majority of US men are circed I do not know.

While penis-in-vagina is lower risk than either anal or IV drug use, there are plenty of men getting infected who have done the former but neither of the latter.

Originally Posted by Minky

I dont think it makes it right to forcibly circumcise anyone no. But if men who were unwilling to have safe sex used it as an option why not?

Well, they'd be extremely foolish, for one thing. I think it's very dangerous to make men believe that they'd be protected from AIDS this way. Not just because they'll be going and getting circumcised, but that's a real good way to get the AIDs numbers soaring again. "It's okay baby, we don't need a rubber. I'm cut."

[TortelliniMama]

Originally Posted by Daisyuk

It couldn't be that Italian scientists are close to getting a vaccine breakthrough and thus rendering all the circ. research unnecessary could it?

Oh, heck, I don't think that would render circ research unnecessary. They'll just come up with yet another ill that it's the cure for. I think we would suddenly start hearing about how circ'd men have higher fertility rates or something.

I've wondered, are there researchers doing this same sort of research on FGM? The "it's healthier/cleaner" excuse is given for that, too, right? So is there anyone trying to back that up, too?

[Minky]

I agree htat it's dangerous for people to think they're protected just because they're circumcised. But look how many people got infected just out of this test group. Its clear that in the country where this study took place AIDS is a much bigger problem than in the U.S. and people are NOT using condoms. Thats why I said I don't think this can apply to the U.S.

[Frankly Speaking]

Originally Posted by TortelliniMama

I've wondered, are there researchers doing this same sort of research on FGM? The "it's healthier/cleaner" excuse is given for that, too, right? So is there anyone trying to back that up, too?

Oh, YES! We can thank Daisy for this link:

http://www.ias-2005.org/planner/Abstracts.aspx?AID=3138

Of course, everyone here in the industrialized world will reject this quickly while actually believing the male study!



Frank