The Ministry of Health has finally kicked the trial of a non-surgical circumcision method for infants in the Acholi sub region.
A team of ten doctors from the Ministry of Health under the National Safe Male Circumcision Programme.
The team trained on the new method which involves the use of Gomco clamp are already in at Gulu Regional Referral Hospital and are working on children aged between 1- 28 days.
Gomco clamp is a metal device with a bell-shaped end.
During circumcision, the baby’s foreskin is stretched over the bell and the clamp is tightened over his skin.
Currently only adults are being circumcised using a non-surgical method called prepex, a medical device used to carry out male circumcision among adults.
Dr Edward Nelson Kankaka, one of the specialists explained on Tuesday that the babies won’t be injected to sedate the skin but rather the use of a cream and a Gomco clamp before the foreskin is removed.
Dr Kankaka said that the new method of circumcision is best suited for infants saying that research has shown that it’s safe among babies.
Dr Kankaka further said the babies who undergo the procedure will take a week to heal unlike in adults which can take a longer time.
The doctor noted that the health benefits of circumcising a baby include lowering the risk of penile cancer which may affect them in their later life, recurrent urinary tract infections and lowering the risk of infection with cervical cancer and HIV/Aids.
He explained that uncircumcised men have higher risk of developing cancer of the penis because of there is a relationship between cells in their foreskins and the terminal illness.
Dr Hope Kusaasarim, the head of Safe Male Circumcision (SMC) at Gulu Regional Referral Hospital urged parents to consider circumcising their children.
Mogen clamp was introduced in Uganda one and half years ago.
A non-surgical circumcision method for infants using a Gomco clamp is being tested under a pilot project in Uganda and will be available nationwide by the end of the year.
So far, 1,000 babies have been circumcised with the new method.
According to Dr Barbara Nanteza, the co-coordinator of the National Safe Male Circumcision Programme at Health’s Ministry, the non-surgical method for both infants and adults is cost-effective because it takes a short time to carry out, requires less expertise and manpower and uses minimum anaesthesia.
In private medical facilities, the medical procedure cost between 100,000- 150,000 shillings.
A report by Uganda Aids Commission found that, by the end of 2013, 1.4 million had undergone the procedure.
1 Comment
Why are infants being genitally cut at all? They are at virtually no risk of HIV. The WHO only ever endorsed VOLUNTARY ADULT genital cutting, and infants can’t volunteer. By the time they are adults there will be better ways to protect against HIV (and I strongly suspect, genital cutting will have been exposed as useless). Most of the developed world doesn’t cut babies, only the USA and Israel, and it is those two countries that are pushing male genital cutting in Africa.
It is a lie to call the Gomco clamp method “non-surgical”. The clamp is just a guide for the knife, and because it first crushes the foreskin it is exquisitely painful. “Minimal” anaesthesia is not enough.
The Mogen Company has gone out of business after owing millions to the families of boys whose penises were botched in Mogen clamps.