Circumcising men routinely across Africa could prevent millions of deaths from AIDS, World Health Organization researchers and colleagues reported on Monday.
They analyzed data from trials that showed men who had been circumcised had a significantly lower risk of infection with the AIDS virus, and calculated that if all men were circumcised over the next 10 years, some two million new infections and around 300,000 deaths could be avoided.
[Extending the results from the trial area –] “This analysis shows that male circumcision could avert nearly six million new infections and save three million lives in sub-Saharan Africa over the next twenty years.”
Of course, adding a new method — even one with significant results like this — doesn’t take away from the need for education and accessibility to safe sex practices.
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We had another recent post on circumcision here.
“cut” millions, eh?
let the puns roll in..
no, but seriously, it seems there is always a good reason behind some of the (sometimes seemingly odd) things that God of the bible instructed folks to do…
I remember reading something recently from american medical stating “there is no health reason for circumsision” and now I see something to the counter.
what will we know tomorrow? do we know anything today?
#2
There is no health reason for circumcision. Ever since running water became common place, you can keep your knob as clean as your elbow. And if you start poking the dirtiest holes in town, do you honestly want to take a chance that your circumcision will help? The other part of the bible is prudence and fidelity you know…
Yes, so the Bible was saying that God was in error basically for giving humans a foreskin to begin with.
A sign of a covenant with God? Er….ok, then why the foreskin? Why not the left pinkie? The right little toe? How come women are excluded from the covenant since they have no “foreskin” to speak of really….unless you count the hood around the clitoris. But the Bible only singles out men for this covenant. And again, why the foreskin? Because it signals the covenant AND it was a health issue back then.
Which brings it back around, if it was also a health issue back then, then the Bible is suggesting that the infallible God is in fact fallible as he made the foreskin which he wanted men to cut off. And, I’ll go further in the proof that God is fallible and imperfect because he DID create Man….God made an imperfect and flawed being to begin with, then has the GALL to be mad at his total screw-up (mankind) and blaming it for everything!
Or it could be just a bunch of fiction written around 2000 years ago by a bunch of goofballs….you decide.
Also, you can have my foreskin when you pry it from my cold, dead fingers…..or something…
Wow, Johnny-Cakes. For someone who isn’t circumcised, you sure care a lot about circumcision.
This is just the latest in a long history of attempts to justify male genital mutilation. The truth is that although most men in the U.S. are circumcised, we still have one of the highest HIV rates in the developed world. The only proven way to stop the spread of HIV is condom use, which, by the way, is cheaper than circumcision. Is there a slight decrease in risk for circumcised men contracting HIV? Perhaps. But female genital mutilation has been shown to convey comparable protection and you don’t hear people calling for the mass circumcision of African women.
I see articles of this nature this way:
“Hey, Africa is such a nice hospitable place briming full of resources to support the high standard of life for the people there, lets add another 2 million a year to the mix! Yea more people!”
When did you have sex last? Was it expressely for the purpose of making a baby?
Were you a virgin until marriage? Have you looked with lust at another woman since (thou shalt not covet)?
The anti-circumcision nuts make the liberals look sane.
Heh-heh, heh-heh. He said “anti-circumcision nuts”…
Hmm, perhaps it would be better to just distribute condoms and investigate ways to lessen the social stigma of using them. Possibly cheaper and certainly a whole lot less painful.
“When did you have sex last?”
Last night
“Was it expressely for the purpose of making a baby?”
No – it was purely for pleasure
“Were you a virgin until marriage?”
Yes
“Have you looked with lust at another woman since”
Of course. I never said I was perfect 🙂
I was actually trying to point out to that to Vagus who said: “The only proven way to stop the spread of HIV is condom use”. That there is another alternative.
Cut, millions and only save WHAT?? 300,000…
Lets see, as being a patriotic and religious nation…HOW are these men catching it?? And WHOM gave it to the females ANYWAY??
For something that was for Gay males, this has really spead into the wild. Its becoming a national problem EVEN HERE..
I love some of the comments here…
Virgin, in the capital of RAPE??? LMAO..
some locations in the middle east are 10+ men to 1 women…
I wont get into that subject as its VERY VERY BAD situation.
This us just a conspiracy theory done by the cosmethic companies to gain cheap baby foreskins for their makeup creams.
Abstinence is not a realistic solution, because it fails to take into account certain basic facts about human nature. It works in theory for individuals, but it’s not really plausible when dealing with large groups of people.
#4 Johnny….it’s clear in the O.T. that it was a covenant with God. You might need to ask God why not a Pinkie or an ear or whatever.
But to be realisitic, most of the do’s and don’t’s of the O.T. are basically health and welfare rules for the times.
#7 Vagus…..female genital mutilation has been going on for centuries in many parts of Africa for young females in certain Muslim sects. It is done to lessen or remove the female enjoyment of sex to stop *wantoness*.
Abstinance and fidelity are good forms of birth control and control of STD’s.
#15 ECA….HIV/AIDs was not a Gay *thing*. It started in Africa, with hetrosexuals and spread to Gays who had sex with them and then spread world wide. I’m not sure if they still think this is the cause, but at one time they were very sure that HIV/AIDs came from Monkeys, who carried the virus but weren’t affected by it, and the monkeys were then eaten by tribes during famine periods, thus transferring it to humans through blood.
#18 Vagus….large or small groups of people ARE individuals massed together. It dosen’t work well due mainly to how we view morals today as opposed to how they may have been viewed in the past. I was abstinante for a long time until I realized that my hand didn’t grow hair on the palm and I figured the story my Dad told me about my d**k falling off if I had pre-marital sex might be a lie as well.
Name apparently has a flap of skim covering a layer of mucus on his elbow.
Joshua…I’m aware of the cultural reasons given for FGM. My point was that there have been some studies that have shown that women who are circumcised have a slightly lower risk of contracting HIV, probably, because they have scar tissue covering what would normally be a major site of infection. The same may be true for male circumcision, but there is a double standard as we in the West are horrified by female circumcision (the WHO for example has set out to end this practice in Africa), but rather accepting of its male circumcision. This is a complex subject that has a lot to do with our conception of male vs. female sexuality, but the bottom line is, opposition to one should lead logically to opposition of the other.
The notion that “how we view morals today” is in some way responsible for the fact that the abstinence strategy doesn’t work, ignores history. I don’t think that there was ever a time in human history, when people didn’t mess around. To suggest otherwise is to see the past through rose-tinted spectacles.
No guy should be walking around with a stinking germ Jacuzzi on the end of their dick.
If I follow the same kinf of the logical path #4 uses to defy God, then, I must ignore his post, because: since Johnny can’t use proper grammar, he can’t possibly have anything true to say.
yeah, that makes sense.
oh, wait, my grammar’s off too, maybe it doesn’t make sense.
Sorry Johnny,
oh, and can anyone explain #3’s position to me? did he read the post? and when did I become … oh, nevermind
So I guess you would support making circumcision mandatory? Kids shouldn’t be allowed into public schools if they are uncircumcised?
#21…Vagus…..when you consider that 99% of female genital mutilation is done on Muslim girls in a very strict and controlled society, the fact that they have a slightly lower incidence of STD’s can’t be attributed to the fact of the genital mutilation alone. These girls are so controled that almost always the only sex they have is with their husbands.
I didn’t say sex wasn’t always a big deal, I just meant that sex isn’t a hidden thing as it once was. It was easier in the pre-technology era to resist pressures to have sex before marriage. Social stigma, as well as less peer pressure were pretty big incentives to not have it.