NYC Eyes Circumcision Push to Fight AIDS

City health officials of New York are looking into a program that will urge circumcision for men who are at high risk of AIDS. The health officials are basing the program on the fact of studies that have shown that circumcision reduces a man's chances of getting AIDS.

Reported in the New York Times, the city Department of Health and Mental Hygiene sought out feedback from gay rights groups. The Department has even spoken with city hospitals and health clinics about looking into offering circumcision to men without health insurance for free.

The studies that all of this are based on was done in Uganda, Kenya and South Africa on men who claimed to have sex with just women. These men in the studies were heterosexuals and showed a reduced risk by up to 60 percent.

But according to the New York Times, the men at the highest risk in New York are men who have sex with other men, inject drugs and their sexual partners.

Health Commissioner Thomas Frieden, urges that circumcision could hold preventative promise regardless of the differences in the two at-risk populations. Frieden even called New York City " the epicenter of the AIDS epidemic" in the United States.

The U.N. health agencies have even joined the bandwagon on this when they recommended last week that heterosexual men be circumcised.

The National Center for Health Statistics shows that in the United States around 65 percent of all male babies are indeed circumcised. 30 percent of men worldwide are circumcised according to estimates from the World Health Organization.

Local AIDS activist are divided down the middle on this. One side is doubting that circumcision would drastically reduce the infection rates. The other side is feeling that a study specific to New York needs to be preformed.

Peter Staley, an AIDS activist and the co-founder of ACT-UP New York was quoted as saying," Should we proceed when we don't have hard data yet on the population here? On the other hand, if we wait the three years it would take to answer that question, how many will be infected in the meantime?"

Mayor Michael Bloomberg stated Thursday that he was still unsure what role the city should have on circumcision. Bloomberg didn't know if this was something that the government should have any involvement in or if it should be left to just giving advice and educating people.

Sources:

Associated Press:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070405/ap_on_he_me/aids_circumcision;_ylt=AkGSkQTxrQlxfnWAChx8.D_MWM0F

Del Rio News-Herald:
http://www.delrionewsherald.com/wire.lasso?report=/dynamic/stories/A/AIDS_CIRCUMCISION

New York City Health Department:
http://www.nyc.gov/html/doh