Men's Health > Circumcision > AIDS

Circumcision Lowers Chances for AIDS

Men who are circumcised have a dramatically lower rate of HIV infection than those who are not, according to new studies in Africa and India, suggesting that the ancient surgical procedure may play a role in helping prevent the spread of the deadly virus.

One unpublished household survey in Kenya has shown that uncircumcised men have an HIV rate that is 11 times greater, while a second study in India has found uncircumcised men have a seven times higher rate of infection. Other studies showed that Zambia and Ethiopia had lower rates of HIV infection in areas of the countries where circumcision was more common.

Circumcision Circumstances?

Researchers have suspected a link between infant circumcision and HIV prevention for more than 15 years. In the United States, studies have shown that high circumcision rates have had a protective benefit for heterosexual Americans ... but most specialists have not recommended the procedure because they believed that other factors such as religious and cultural beliefs might explain the link.

The recent Kenya data, however, have given new impetus among some AIDS experts to focus more attention on the issue. Leaders in at least two African countries, Swaziland and Zambia, have said that, while they want more definitive evidence linking circumcision with preventing HIV, they say the epidemiological studies have startled them.

World Health Organization officials, however, warn that ongoing clinical trials need to be completed before deciding whether circumcision should be recommended as a prevention tool against the spread of HIV.

Those studies, underway in Kenya, Uganda, and South Africa, will be completed in one to three years.

Excess Baggage?

Circumcision, the removal of the foreskin of the penis, is one of the world's oldest and most common surgical procedures. It is part of a ritual practiced for thousands of years by Jews and Muslims. Many Christians and people of other faiths also are circumcised, and the procedure is most often performed on infants. Recently however, a foreskin restoration trend has emerged among circumcised males.

Circumcision is already known to reduce a man's risk of penile cancer. A study of 393 men from a clinic in Tuscon, published last month in the journal Sexually Transmitted Diseases, also found that circumcision may reduce the risk of cervical cancer in female sexual partners. That confirmed an earlier five-country study published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

Foreskin Rates

In Africa, the countries with the highest rates of HIV infection are in the far south, which have low circumcision rates because of a cultural circumcision controversy.

Countries in West Africa and the island nation of Madagascar have lower HIV prevalence and very high male circumcision rates.

Obviously, additional scientific studies are underway to verify the existence of a cause and effect link regarding circumcision and AIDS rates.

Paul Ellis