(Reuters) - There is not enough evidence to say circumcision protects men from getting the AIDS virus during sex with other men even as studies show it protects them when having sex with women, U.S. researchers said on Tuesday.
A review of 15 studies involving 53,567 gay and bisexual men in the United States, Britain, Canada, Australia, India, Taiwan, Peru and the Netherlands failed to show a clear benefit for those who were circumcised, researchers from the U.S. government's Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said. More...
Why are we still studying this? Whatever mild effect circumcision may have on disease transmission, it DOES NOT prevent AIDS. Most of the half-million American men who have died of AIDS were circumcised at birth.
ReplyDeleteThe idea of amputating an exquisite body part to fight disease is as ridiculous as it is offensive. You know, there are studies showing female genital cutting fights AIDS. The very thought is sick and wrong, for either gender.
Foreskin feels REALLY good.
Nobody seems to be looking at the effect of circumcision on HIV transmission in the other direction. There is every reason to suppose that a hardened (keratinised) glans, being moved more vigorously by a man who's missing 10,000 fine-touch nerves, is more likely to create microtears in his partner's rectum or vagina, increasing the likelihood of transmitting HIV to the receptive partner.
ReplyDeleteBut because that doesn't vindicate circumcision, it'll be hard for any study proving it to gain funding or publication.
Circumcision has been a "cure" looking for a disease for over a century, and all sorts of studies claiming to show protective effects have been published and loudly reported, then quietly shelved when real-world experience proved them wrong.