Babies' foreskins could be sold: Ethics watchdog
Image by: KEVIN SUTHERLAND 09/06/2009
Doctors and ethicists are embroiled in a dispute with Health Minister Aaron Motsoaledi over fears that babies' foreskins will be sold illicitly to the global cosmetics industry.
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.
The network's bioethics forum also warns that although biosamples, or any "excess tissue" removed during operations must, by law, be discarded as "biohazardous waste", anyone who has access to the discarded tissue might decide to export it to participate in a multibillion-dollar industry without appropriate consent.
"It is a dangerous presumption to believe that the days of unethical conduct in research is over. In spite of the fact that the South African Human Tissue Act requires that researchers obtain a permit from the South African Ministry of Health to export human tissues, this law is difficult to enforce," the letter continues.
Poonitha Naidoo, a co-ordinator for the network, said discarded baby foreskins contain regenerative stem cells that can't be grown in a laboratory: "They use this to remove wrinkles - it can grow new skin for plastic surgery."
Naidoo said one mother had claimed that the hospital refused to give her the foreskin of her son after it was removed.
Motsoaledi's spokesman, Fidel Hadebe, said doctors have no reason to fear.
"All foreskins are incinerated. No foreskins are sold to the cosmetics industry. Doing so would be against the Human Tissue Act," Hadebe said.
But Mary de Haas, who is co-chairman of the bioethics forum and a research fellow at the University of KwaZulu-Natal's school of law, said: "There have been cases in the US where people steal them from the bins because of the commercial value.
"We are worried that pushing for circumcision means that there are vested commercial interests," she said.
De Haas said the increasing global trade in human tissues was a type of "bio-colonialism".
Hadebe said anyone caught trading in foreskins would be in violation of the law and would be dealt with accordingly.
But Naidoo insisted that the government allow members of the Medical Rights Advocacy Network to act as independent monitors, to make sure that the foreskins were being correctly disposed of.
She added that if any parent felt they had been pressured into having their baby circumcised, the network would help them take legal action.
"Hadebe can say the foreskins will be disposed of but nobody is monitoring what is happening on the ground. Anyone could sell these foreskins, from nurses through to morticians," said Naidoo.
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Babies' foreskins could be sold: Ethics watchdog
For Commenters Consideration | Please stick to the subject matterCOMMENTS [7]
TLCTugger
Posted 680 days agoThe only person with the moral right to consent to amputation of a healthy normal VALUABLE sexual body part is the owner; the one who will have to live with the consequeces.
BronwynMillar
Posted 679 days agoNot a MENTION of the fact that the ACT of routine circumcision is now illegal in South Africa.
The major issue here is that non medical and non religious circumcision is already illegal in South Africa but these idiots are just IGNORING THE LAW!!!
Here is the wording to the childrens act that was gazetted in April last year:
Children's Act, 2005 (Act No. 38 of 2005)
...Chapter 2 : General Principles
12. Social, cultural and religious practices
8) Circumcision of male children under the age of 16 is prohibited, except when-
a) circumcision is performed for religious purposes in accordance with the practices of the religion concerned and in the manner prescribed; or
b) circumcision is performed for medical reasons on the recommendation of a medical practitioner.
9) Circumcision of male children older than 16 may only be performed-
a) if the child has given consent to the circumcision in the prescribed manner;
b) after proper counselling of the child; and
c) in the manner prescribed.
10) Taking into consideration the child’s age, maturity and stage of development, every male child has the right to refuse circumcision.
kai100
Posted 679 days agoJohnGeisheker
Posted 679 days agoAnglo-European proponents have already admitted the massive circumcision campaign can only afford to employ non-medical personnel, who will arrive at a village clinic, round up the men and babies, only to disappear, leaving infections and botched results behind. They are already using dishonest ‘health’ claims to market their wares, failing to note that while circumcision might protect men, it endangers their female partners and discourages condom use.
The circumcisionists will use out-of-date, relabeled or ‘refurbished’ medical supplies, or sell these at inflated prices to local health authorities. They are developing ever cheaper, unsafe, and unproven plastic clamps to enrich the inventors and themselves. They will test these on YOU. They have attracted huge sums of money from well-meaning charities, and will be rich beyond their dreams long after this nightmare is recognized by South Africans for what it is.
Our advice to South Africans: do not let desperation force you to strike bargains with these charlatans. Beware of colonizers, or their paid proxies, bearing medical ‘gifts’ which involve cutting healthy tissue from healthy children without the consent of the child.
John V. Geisheker, J.D., LL.M.
Executive Director,
General Counsel,
Doctors Opposing Circumcision
DoctorsOpposingCircumcision.org
JamesMac
Posted 679 days agoU.S. corporations like Organogenesis Inc. NEED to maintain the supply of foresk*n for their own commercial interests. Below is from their 2001 Annual Report. Make sure you protect your children from these modern-day 'body snatchers'.
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WE MUST BE ABLE TO OBTAIN ADEQUATE SOURCES OF SUPPLY
We manufacture Apligraf for commercial sale, as well as for use in clinical trials, at our Canton, Massachusetts facility. Among the fundamental raw materials needed to manufacture Apligraf are keratinocyte and fibroblast cells. Because these cells are derived from donated infant foresk*n, they may contain human-borne pathogens. We perform extensive testing of the cells for pathogens, including the HIV or "AIDS" virus. Our inability to obtain cells of adequate purity, or cells that are pathogen-free, would limit our ability to manufacture sufficient quantities of our products.
joseph.lewis
Posted 679 days agoAnd this isn't even getting into all the equipment used for the procedure, from Circumstraint, to Gomco, to Plastibell. Isn't KwaZulu Natal already having a scandal due to the TaraKlamp which hasn't even been approved by the WHO yet? The ProPex people can't wait for the WHO to approve of their product so they can spread it all across Rwanda etc.
It is heartening to know that people in Africa are beginning to become aware of yet again another exploitation. Workers can earn money from PEPFAR, Bill Gates etc., AND sell the foreskins, which are needed for stem cell research and the creation of consumer products such as Skin Medica's TNX Recovery Complex. Other synthetic skin grafts are created from the foreskins of newborns, including Dermagraft-TC, Apligraf and AlloDerm. The corporations that stand to gain from the harvesting of infant foreskins are Advanced Tissue Sciences (ATS), Organogenesis, BioSurface Technology, Genzyme, Ortec International, LifeCell Corporation (Nasdaq:LIFC) and SkinMedica.
Africans, ask yourselves; is this REALLY about HIV prevention and "health benefits?" Or is it just another ploy to plunder the resources of Africa? Do western "humanitarian aid" organizations really care about your healths? Or is it about establishing a steady flow of foreskins? The fact is that Americans are beginning to shun circumcision; these corporations must secure their foreskins from elsewhere. Could it be these "studies" are being cooked for this purpose? There needs to be an investigation into who is funding all this circumcision "research" and why. WHY aren't "researchers" investigating HIV prevention methods that do NOT require cutting off parts of children?
Hughx
Posted 678 days agoSo there is still no case for encouraging parents to cut parts off the genitals of babies - even if it were legal.