OVER half a million men are to be offered circumcision in Swaziland and Zambia to curb the spread of HIV. It is the first time circumcision has been proposed on this scale in AIDS hotspots.
Circumcision can cut a man鈥檚 risk of HIV infection by 60 per cent, and in the past African men have queued up to be circumcised. The new programme is funded to the tune of $50 million by the , enough for 650,000 procedures. Under the programme, these will only be carried out by fully trained medical professionals, which could help prevent men from being harmed.
鈥淚t鈥檚 great news, and this is exactly what鈥檚 needed,鈥� says Catherine Hankins, chief scientific adviser at . She stresses however that circumcision alone won鈥檛 rule out infection with HIV, and that circumcised men should take additional precautions such as wearing condoms and limiting their numbers of sexual partners.
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