2011-08-08 timeslive.co.za - Babies' foreskins could be sold: Ethics watchdog

[mesther]

Commercial interests in male circumcision, specifically for the anti-wrinkle cosmetic market, spark heated debate in South Africa.
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Babies' foreskins could be sold: Ethics watchdog
By: Anna Majavu

The KwaZulu-Natal department of health said last year that from April 2012 it would, for the first time, offer circumcision as an option to 10% of the mothers of male babies born in public hospitals.

Until now babies have been circumcised for religious or medical reasons.

The decision has raised the ire of the Medical Rights Advocacy Network's bioethics forum which says that a potential 2.3 million foreskins are at stake.

The network has written a letter to Motsoaledi, KwaZulu-Natal MEC Dr Sibongiseni Dhlomo and premier Zweli Mkhize, urging them not to go through with their plans to circumcise babies.

"Africa may be viewed as the new source of discarded virgin foreskins to sustain a multi-million-dollar industry. Discarded human foreskins are used in the cosmetics industry, in the manufacture of insulin and artificial skin," the Medical Rights Advocacy Network warns in the letter.

For full article: http://www.timeslive.co.za/local/2011/08/08/babies-foreskins-could-be-sold-ethics-watchdog

[Minuteman]

A thread for collating official statements, medical article abstracts and the like, regarding the use of foreskin-derived products (both as an ingredient and as a testing medium), with a focus on helping readers prepare arguments to present to the FDA in the lead up to, and to participants at the sixth "International Cooperation on Cosmetic Regulation" (ICCR-6) conference itself (to be held in the United States sometime around June 2012), about why it is ethically unsound and medically unnecessary to use neonatal foreskin derived products in the cosmetic and medical industries, has been started here:

http://www.foreskin-restoration.net/forum/showthread.php?t=8415

Credible submissions to the FDA in the lead up to the ICCR-6 conference present the best avenue for seriously addressing this issue.

[admin]

Commercial interests in male circumcision, specifically for the anti-wrinkle cosmetic market, spark heated debate in South Africa.
__________________________________________________ ____________--

Babies' foreskins could be sold: Ethics watchdog
By: Anna Majavu

The KwaZulu-Natal department of health said last year that from April 2012 it would, for the first time, offer circumcision as an option to 10% of the mothers of male babies born in public hospitals.

Until now babies have been circumcised for religious or medical reasons.

The decision has raised the ire of the Medical Rights Advocacy Network's bioethics forum which says that a potential 2.3 million foreskins are at stake.

The network has written a letter to Motsoaledi, KwaZulu-Natal MEC Dr Sibongiseni Dhlomo and premier Zweli Mkhize, urging them not to go through with their plans to circumcise babies.

"Africa may be viewed as the new source of discarded virgin foreskins to sustain a multi-million-dollar industry. Discarded human foreskins are used in the cosmetics industry, in the manufacture of insulin and artificial skin," the Medical Rights Advocacy Network warns in the letter.

For full article: http://www.timeslive.co.za/local/2011/08/08/babies-foreskins-could-be-sold-ethics-watchdog

As pointed out in the comments section, the proposed circumcising plan is illegal in South Africa.