Health benefits of male circumcision should be recognised by public health system
Massey’s Director Pasifika wants the Government to consider making circumcision available through the public health
system in light of studies suggesting the procedure has health benefits for men and women as well as being considered
important to Pacific people.
Professor Sitaleki Finau says studies show male circumcision helps prevent the spread of sexually transmitted diseases,
including Aids, and there is a proven link between circumcised men and a decrease in cervical cancer caused by the human
pampilloma virus.
He says New Zealand health authorities should take note of World Health Organisation backing for United States trials in
Uganda, Kenya and South Africa confirming male circumcision can cut heterosexual HIV transmission by up to 60 per cent.
In a paper titled Circumcision of Pacific Boys: Tradition at the Cutting Edge, presented at a recent Public Health
Association Conference in Auckland, Professor Finau provided insights into why most Pacific boys in New Zealand and in
the islands continue to be circumcised.
This is despite a dramatic swerve away from the procedure that was almost standard for all army recruits and newborn
boys born in New Zealand in the 1940s.
About 95 per cent of newborn boys were circumcised in that decade, but the numbers started to decline about 1950 to the
point where circumcision rates in public hospitals last decade were about 0.35 per cent of total male births.
Currently, circumcision on social or religious grounds is unavailable in the New Zealand public health system and
although virtually all of the 100,000 Samoan and Tongan males living in New Zealand are circumcised, the procedure must
be paid for at private surgeries and health clinics.
Professor Finau thinks the Ministry of Health should review its policy – despite the climate of heightened emotion about
human rights and the non-therapeutic removal of foreskin described by some men’s groups as genital mutilation.
Evidence that circumcision lowers a boy’s chance of suffering urinary tract infections, eliminates the risk of
infections under the foreskin, decreases the risk of developing cancer of the penis (although a very rare condition) and
reduces the risk for men of contracting sexually transmitted diseases are grounds for making male circumcision, he says.
“It’s in the national interest to circumcise men to protect men and women, and save on cervical cancer management. Women
would be getting a good deal if more men were circumcised.”
Professor Finau says male circumcision among Pacificans is “a solemn ritual” and an important male rite of passage
carried out between the ages of seven and 15 years. “Being circumcised is sign of manliness and sexual prowess. Not to
be circumcised can bring shame on a man and his partner and family.”
He says there is evidence male circumcision was being done in the Pacific before the arrival of Europeans. The use of
bone, bamboo and shell tools has been replaced by modern medical methods available in designated clinics such as the
Langimalie Clinic, run by the Tongan Health Society in Onehunga, Auckland.
Before joining Massey last year, Professor Finau was Professor of Public Health at the Fiji School of Medicine in Suva
and has previously held academic appointments at the Universities of Otago and Auckland.
He has a medical degree from
the University of Queensland as well as Fellowships from the Australasian College of Tropical Medicine, and the
Australasian Faculty of Public Health Medicine.
Remuera gynacologist John Thomson is also in favour of circumcision becoming available through the public health system
as an effective method of preventing the spread of sexually transmitted diseases.
Dr Thomson has performed more than 6000 circumcisions in his private clinic in the past 30 years using a non-surgical
device attached to the penis that causes the foreskin to come off in a few days.
The procedure costs from $170 for very small babies and more for older infants. He recommends babies be circumcised by
six weeks of age. Most of the circumcisions he carries out are on Muslim boys.
ENDS