A young Kurdish girl undergoing circumcision
Circumcision of women is an emotive and politicised topic blurring any understanding of the personal, cultural, religious and medical reasons or justification for the practice. There are cases of women voluntarily going for surgery to narrow their vaginal opening. In our view this is not female circumcision, therefore not the focus of this advice below.
Circumcision of women has been described by different names like female genital mutilation, female genital cutting and female circumcision. Circumcision is mostly carried out on young girls sometime between infancy and age 15 years.
The Word health Organisation (WHO) defines female circumcision as “all procedures that involve partial or total removal of the external female genitalia, or other injury to the female genital organs for non-medical reasons.” Female genital mutilation includes procedures that intentionally alter or injure female genital organs for non-medical reasons.
Female circumcision is not limited to traditionalists in third world countries as most would expect but also carried out by some medical centres. These medical centres include those in some western countries, where it is performed as a painless procedure under local anaesthetic. There is no evidence currently available to suggest that women have any health benefits from circumcision.
Countries that are known to practice female circumcision are in Africa, western and southern Asia and the Middle East. Although it is illegal, it is still carried out among immigrant communities in the Australia, Britain, Canada, France, and USA. An estimated two million girls a year are subjected to genital mutilation. WHO estimated that between 100 to 140 million girls and women worldwide are currently living with the consequences of female genital mutilation.
Women Circumcision Procedures
In our view, where the act cannot be stopped, it is essential to insist that all instruments used are sterile, single use and disposable only. This had the advantage of greatly reducing the risk of blood borne infections, such as HIV and Hepatitis. The female circumcision procedures can cause severe bleeding and problems urinating, and may cause potential childbirth complications and newborn deaths. For an image of traditional female circumcision in Africa, please click this link. There are four main types of female circumcision:
Excision: partial or total removal of the clitoris and the labia minora, with or without excision of the labia majora (the labia are “the lips” that surround the vagina).
Clitoridectomy: partial or total removal of the clitoris (a small, sensitive and erectile part of the female genitals) and, in very rare cases, only the prepuce (the fold of skin surrounding the clitoris).
Infibulation: narrowing of the vaginal opening through the creation of a covering seal. The seal is formed by cutting and repositioning the inner, or outer, labia, with or without removal of the clitoris.
Other: all other harmful procedures to the female genitalia for non-medical purposes, e.g. pricking, piercing, incising, scraping and cauterizing the genital area.
Women circumcision health risks
Currently there are no known benefits of female circumcision. What is certain is that circumcision can harms girls and women in many ways. Women circumcision involves removing and damaging healthy and normal female genital tissue, and interferes with the natural functions of girls’ and women’s bodies.
The procedures for women circumcision can cause immediate complications, such as severe pain, shock, severe bleeding, bacterial infection, urine retention, open sores in the genital region and injury to nearby genital tissue. In the long-term circumcised women may suffer from recurrent bladder and urinary tract infections; cysts; infertility; an increased risk of childbirth complications and newborn deaths.
Women circumcised using the infibulations type of circumcision that seals or narrows a vaginal opening are likely to need surgeries to repair the genital mutilation. The surgery procedure needs to be cut open later to allow for sexual intercourse and childbirth.
Sometimes it is stitched again several times, including after childbirth, hence the woman goes through repeated opening and closing procedures, further increasing and repeated both immediate and long-term risks.
Cultural, religious and social causes
Female circumcision is the result of myths strongly held within families and communities that have its origin in cultural and religious beliefs, and mixed with the need to conform to social convention. There is nothing more motivating for many in the under developed world than to conform to what others do.
In many cultures the way for them to bring up a girl properly and to prepare them for adulthood and marriage is to circumcise them. In other cultures, circumcised women are believed to be less promiscuous, with proper sexual behavior. They therefore link the circumcision with premarital virginity and marital fidelity.
What is certain is that there is no evidence that female circumcision will reduce their woman’s libido, thereby helping the women resists “illicit” sexual acts. The presumption in those cultures is that illicit sexual acts by their women are caused by their desire to satisfy sexual needs. That might have been the case in the years gone by, but these days illicit sexual act by women is caused by a desire to earn money to keep body and soul together.
There are several other cultural and social reasons put to justify female circumcision, but in our view these reasons are based on myths, fear and inability to think outside the box. Those who claim religious reasons to justify female circumcision would do well to read their books again because no religious scripts prescribe female genital mutilation.
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