Haemorrhage or bleeding is the greatest risk and if severe, can be fatal or require a blood transfusion.
Infection is another severe complication. The raw surface is easily contaminated and the infant”: ability to fight infection is not well developed. The infection may spread to the blood, causing fatal septicaemia.
I am uncertain of the figures for Australia but it is estimated that in America each year there will be nearly IV2 million routine circumcisions and that these will lead to over 200 deaths.
Now, I have been painting a grim picture of the hazards of circumcision, but parents should understand that this operation is, in most cases, an unnecessary but harmless procedure. It is carried out for social rather than medical reasons.
While we may be prepared to accept these risks for necessary surgical procedures, a lot of thought should be given before undertaking operations for non-medical reasons.
The risk of complications from circumcision is indeed small and most infants survive this procedure with minimum discomfort.
Sexual performance or enjoyment does not seem to be affected by presence or absence of the foreskin.
Cancer of the penis, a rare cancer, is more common in the uncircumcised and this is thought to be due to the action of a chemical called smegma which is produced under the prepuce. However, circumcision to prevent the development of this cancer later in life is carrying preventive medicine a little too far.
*24/71/1*
There are a great many different types of cancer. Each of the many different types of normal cells in our bodies can give rise to a cancerous growth under certain circumstances. Cancers start more often in cells which frequently replace themselves than in cells which are very stable. When we study a specimen from a cancer under the microscope we find that the cells look quite different from the normal mature cells of the organ in which the growth began. The cancer cells are bigger, and less differentiated. As you would expect from their appearance, these cells are useless. They are not capable of carrying out the special functions of the cells from which they started.
Some cancer cells are so undifferentiated that it is very difficult, if not impossible, for the pathologist to work out where in the body they originated. It is important to establish the origin of a cancer as this tells us how it is likely to behave and what treatment is likely to work against it. Therefore, the pathologist must study specimens from poorly-differentiated cancers very carefully. To establish where it started, he or she tries to find traces of the more specialised structures which occur in normal mature cells. Sometimes special techniques are used on the specimen to make such traces apparent.
*32/40/1*