Circumcision: bioethical profiles

The National Commission for Bioethics was interrogated in 1997 by a Committee for Bioethics formed by the Public Health Care System from the Reggio Emilia Area on the issue of ritual circumcision of underaged children (boys and girls) and the legitimacy for Public Health Care Centres and Hospitals to practice ritual circumcision in hygienic conditions of safety. The interrogation in one of its questions mentioned FGM and their being banned by the UNICEF/UNFPA joint declaration. The national Commission, although recognizing the principle of respecting other cultures, finds FGM are unacceptable as practices aimed at irreversibly mutilate women and violently alter their psycho-physical identity, when it can not find a clear justification for the narrow interest of the health of the person in question . It hopes that these practices are explicitly prohibited and fought, even with the introduction of new standards and specifications of a criminal legislation. With regard to male circumcision, the Commission agrees that for its specific therapeutic or prophylactic properties of order, it should be considered lawful. The paper argues that circumcision, as an act of medical and anatomical modification aimed at functional changes, should be practiced by a physician (although not in public health care structures) in full compliance with all the usual rules of hygiene and asepsis.

Policy Framework

Issuer

National Commission for Bioethics