An interesting new study performed among bisexual men from New York, Los Angeles, and Philadelphia indicated that circumcision had almost no effect upon the transmission of HIV. Although previous studies performed in Africa and other parts of the world have indicated a very strong protective effect, this study questions these results. So what could be causing these results? One theory the article presents is that the prevalence of HIV in these communities is so high that it offsets any protection conferred by circumcision. That doesn't seem to make sense to me, since the prevalence rates in Africa would be much higher than in the American communities. So I guess we'll have to wait for further research to find out why this study contradicts the others.
Jon Dyal
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20071204/hl_nm/aids_circumcision_dc;_ylt=AkcbSzWy19Z97vFslb7tCq8Q.3QA
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I think it's really because the original studies only showed a correlation, they did not prove any causation. Gee, the circumcised men got less HIV, but they still got HIV, and there's no real explanation why. You don't have to look hard to find an opposite correlation: USA has high circumcision rates and Europe has low circumcision rates, but USA has the higher HIV rate. All the news outlets suddenly believe that circumcision protects against HIV, when the real answer is still "maybe".
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