The U.S. Centers for Disease and Prevention is recommending that doctors advise teenage boys who are sexually active about the benefits of circumcision, if they are not already circumcised. Circumcision is thought to reduce the risk of contracting and spreading HIV and other sexually transmittable infections.
Most teenage boys in the United States were circumcised a few days after they were born. However, the percentage of baby boys that are circumcised has been dropping in recent years.
The recommendation by the CDC, which also applies to adult men who have not been circumcised, has not been finalized. It will undergo review and be subject to a 45-day period of public comments.
Circumcision of infants has been debated in recent years because a baby cannot give informed consent. Critics of male circumcision say that it is essentially genital mutilation. The CDC recommendations call for teenage boys to be counseled about the procedure with their parents and to have a say in the decision making.
Studies have shown that circumcision-the surgical removal of the foreskin of the penis-is associated with a 50 to 60% reduction in the transmission of HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. It also has been shown to reduce the transmission of herpes infections and the human papilloma virus (HPV), which causes penile and cervical cancer. Men who are circumcised are less likely to transmit bacteria that cause vaginal infections to their partners.
However, critics of circumcision note that the procedure does not eliminate transmission of disease completely and that circumcised men still must practice safe sex, including using condoms and limiting the number of their sex partners. Critics also note that the studies showing a protective effect for circumcision were done in Africa, where heterosexual transmission of HIV is much more common than in the United States.
Being circumcised in infancy is a very safe procedure, with only about 1 in 200 baby boys having a complication. The complication rate rises to 1 in 20 procedures for those aged 10 and older.
