AIDS transmission rates cut through circumcision, says study
(CBS) Can circumcisions stop the spread of AIDS? That question has been debated for years by health experts and those who feel circumcision is a form of mutilation. But researchers behind a new study from Africa say they're the first to prove that community intervention through a circumcision campaign can curb HIV transmission.
Circumcision on ballot in San Francisco: Will voters okay ban?
For the three-year study, researchers studied more than 20,000 circumcised adult men in the South African township of Orange Farm. They found the procedure reduced the rate of infection among these men by over a 76 percent. The findings were announced at an international HIV conference in Rome.
"Reducing the number of new infections with adult male circumcision will save lives and reduce the need for antiretroviral therapy" study author Professor Bertran Auvert, professor of public health at the University of Versailles, said in a written statement. "The roll out of adult safe male circumcision should become a top health priority in Southern and Eastern Africa."
And other countries are joining the effort. Botswana, Kenya, Swaziland, Tanzania and Zimbabwe are among 14 African countries promoting circumcision to its citizens, Bloomberg reported.
"We are changing the social norms," Auvert told Bloomberg. "It's the first time in the world that we have a successful intervention in a community to reduce the sexual transmission of HIV between adults."
Scientists believe the foreskin is susceptible to tears during intercourse, allowing HIV to get into the bloodstream. Also the area under the foreskin provides an environment where a virus can survive.
What does this study mean for America?
Probably not a whole lot. Overall, more American males are circumcised than African males, though U.S. numbers have declined in recent years among newborns. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention adds that African circumcision studies may not have much bearing on U.S. HIV rates. They write that the studies have only shown efficacy for reducing HIV transmission from penile-vaginal sex, the predominant mode of HIV transmission in Africa, "Whereas the predominant mode of sexual HIV transmission in the U.S. is by penile-anal sex among men who have sex with men."
