Circumcision pluses outweigh risks: Pediatricians

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hellfire

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CHICAGO (AP) - The nation's most influential pediatricians group says the health benefits of circumcision in newborn boys outweigh any risks and insurance companies should pay for it.

In its latest policy statement on circumcision, a procedure that has been declining nationwide, the American Academy of Pediatrics moves closer to an endorsement but says the decision should be up to parents.

"It's not a verdict from on high," said policy co-author Dr. Andrew Freedman. "There's not a one-size-fits-all-answer." But from a medical standpoint, circumcision's benefits in reducing risk of disease outweigh its small risks, said Freedman, a pediatric urologist in Los Angeles.

Recent research bolstering evidence that circumcision reduces chances of infection with HIV and other sexually spread diseases, urinary tract infections and penis cancer influenced the academy to update their 13-year-old policy.

Their old stance said potential medical benefits were not sufficient to warrant recommending routinely circumcising newborn boys. The new one says, "The benefits of newborn male circumcision justify access to this procedure for those families who choose it." The academy also says pain relief stronger than a sugar-coated pacifier is essential, usually an injection to numb the area.

The federal Centers for Disease Control and Convention has estimated circumcision costs range from about $200 to $600 nationwide. Coverage varies among insurers and several states have stopped Medicaid funding for circumcisions.

The new policy was published online Monday in Pediatrics. It comes amid ongoing debate over whether circumcision is medically necessary or a cosmetic procedure that critics say amounts to genital mutilation. Activists favoring a circumcision ban made headway in putting it to a vote last year in San Francisco but a judge later knocked the measure off the city ballot, ruling that regulating medical procedures is up to the state, not city officials.

In Germany, Jewish and Muslim leaders have protested a regional court ruling in June that said circumcision amounts to bodily harm.

Meantime, a recent study projected that declining U.S. circumcision rates could add more than $4 billion in health care costs in coming years because of increased illness and infections.

Circumcision involves removing foreskin at the tip of the penis. The procedure can reduce germs that can grow underneath the foreskin, and complications, including bleeding and infection, are rare, the academy says.

Despite the U.S. decline, about half of baby boys nationwide still undergo circumcision, or roughly 1 million each year. The country's overall rate is much higher than in other developed nations, but U.S. rates vary by region and are higher in areas where it is a cultural or religious tradition, including among Jews and Muslims.

Psychologist Ronald Goldman, director of an anti-circumcision group, the Circumcision Resource Center, said studies show circumcision causes loss of sexual satisfaction - a claim the academy said is not supported by the research it reviewed - and can be psychologically harming. Goldman contends medical studies showing benefits are flawed and that the academy's new position is "out of step" with medical groups in other developed countries.

The American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists took part in the research review that led to the new policy and has endorsed it. Circumcisions in hospitals are typically performed by obstetricians or pediatricians.

The CDC also participated in the review, and will consider the academy's updated policy in preparing its own recommendations, a CDC spokesman said. The agency has a fact sheet summarizing circumcision's potential health benefits and risks but no formal guidelines.

The American Medical Association and American Academy of Family Physicians have neutral policies similar to the pediatrics academy's previous position.

Philadelphia social worker Shannon Coyne examined medical research on circumcision before her son was born last September and had a tough time making a decision. She learned that a relative's boy needed reconstructive surgery after a botched circumcision, and that another's son who wasn't circumcised developed urinary infections.

Coyne said she and her husband ultimately decided against circumcision, because she didn't want her baby to have what she considers cosmetic surgery without being able to consent.

Her advice to other parents is "just make an informed decision. Do your research, be open-minded."

Some 18 states have eliminated Medicaid coverage for circumcision, a trend that could contribute to rising health care costs to treat infections if circumcision rates continue to decline, according to a study published Aug. 20 in Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine.

Dr. Aaron Tobian, a Johns Hopkins University assistant professor who co-authored the study, said the academy's updated policy "is a very good step."
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This is quite a turnup. Most paeditric advice has been leaning in the opposite direction. We were originally going to circumcise but decided against. This is one topic that gets people severely wound up so let's see what happens to this thread.
 
Yes well...my mothers family has breast cancer on her side...my grandfather have had skin cancer, prostate cancer and now recently had a cancer removed from his erm.."sluk derm"..sorry not sure what the English word is now. Should I have my prostate removed and my sister have her boobs removed now in case seeing that we are almost guarenteed to have cancer @ some point of our lives? I am sorry....it just does not fly with me.

Besides....if you want to be protected from HIV, use a damn condom. If you think cutting your foreskin off is going to protect you from HIV you are seriously mistaken. Not even condoms are 100% safe..though it is as close as you will get.
 
In other news, arm amptutations significantly reduce the risk of all arm-related conditions.
 
I still dont get why they dont just allow boys to decide if they want the OP when they turn 13. Why does it have to be done to a newborn without consent?
 
I still don't understand how more skin at the tip of the penis is hygienically worse than having less skin.

Is it because if you have no skin at your tip fluids dry out quicker?
 
i'm not going to do this debate again, stop now
 
Interesting...
If you are pro-circumcision then you are a religious nut or a mutilator and there is zero justification.
However if you're pro-circumcision and a medical expert, then you're a money grabber and charlatan.
 
Nerfherder said:
Cut your entire dick off... because then you can't get aids !
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Well, you could still get it through contact with infected blood but yeah that's my point. Of course you can't get diseases in a body part that you no longer have, but that doesn't mean we just start chopping bits off.
 
Nanfeishen said:
Neonatal circumcision is the cheapest and most cost effective, the older one gets the more expensive it becomes.
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Yes, this is because the doctors do to infants things that would have adult patients throttling them for. Helpless patients FTW...
 
Nerfherder said:
Then don't.... no one is forcing you to look at this thread.
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did you forget the other thread that went on for 40 pages with peopel sayign the same thing over and over? :p
 
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