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YES: Aaron Motsoaledi

A GROUP of doctors and academics are embroiled in a dispute with Health Minister Aaron Motsoaledi over the circumcision of babies.

The group is afraid that the foreskins of circumcised babies 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 to 10% of all male babies born in public hospitals.

The move by the government has raised the ire of the independent bioethics forum, a division of the Medical Rights Advocacy Network, who says a potential 2,3 million foreskins are at stake.

Headed by Dr Uttam Govind, a member of the professional board of the Health Professions Council of South Africa, the network has written three letters to Motsoaledi, KZN MEC Sibongiseni Dhlomo and KZN 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 multimillion dollar industry.

"Discarded human foreskins are used in the cosmetic industry and in the manufacturing of insulin and artificial skin," the network wrote in one of the letters.

"Regulations that allow the use of biosamples that would otherwise have been discarded as 'biohazardous waste', may be exported abroad to sustain a multi-million dollar industry without gaining appropriate consent.

"It is a dangerous presumption to believe the days of unethical conduct in research is over. Despite the South African Human Tissue Act requiring 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, coordinator of the network, explained that discarded baby foreskins have regenerative stem cells that can't be grown in a laboratory.

"It is used to remove wrinkles - and it can grow new skin for plastic surgery."

She said she had been told by one mother that the hospital refused to give her the foreskin after it was removed.

Motsoaledi's spokesperson, Fidel Hadebe, said the doctors had no reason for fear.

"All foreskins are incinerated. No foreskins are sold to the cosmetics industry," he told the Sunday Times.

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 must allow members of the Medical Rights Advocacy Network to act as independent monitors, and drop in to hospitals to make sure that the foreskins were being disposed of.

"Hadebe can say the foreskins will be disposed of but nobody is monitoring what is happening. Anyone could sell these foreskins, from nurses through to morticians."

Comments

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Mon May 20 05:22:43 SAST 2013 ::

Aug 8, 2011

tpaz

imagine lip gloss and matt from someone smelly diick....LOL
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Aug 8, 2011

TCTLHAPI

no wonder they look so nice and beautiful thanks to foreskins THAT MALES THEM WHO THEY ARE it removes wrinkels.HEHEHEHEHE
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Aug 8, 2011

OuButiMonate

"It is used to remove wrinkles - and it can grow new skin for plastic surgery."

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we shud get some for Mugabe nd Motoaladi test it on them if it works or not....
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Aug 8, 2011

chemistry

LOL no wonder ladies love to blow job so much, lip gloss is made out of foreskin
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Aug 8, 2011

Papage

Mr Aaron Motsoaledi, stop too much talking and start acting, actions will speak for you, the hospitals are in need of service delivery, your people deployed there are not doing what they suppose to do, have you ever seen nurses going for 3 hours tea break, leaving sick people in pains and when they come back they cut the line and tell those behind to come back tomorrow, it is a shame democratic South Africa we are leaving in, the current leadership of the country is taking us no where. I think we need to recall them all this time around and put people who will have our interest at heart,
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Aug 8, 2011

Knan

Hahahahhaa, i wonder if our ladies will continue using cosmetics too much after discovering about this?
"It is used to remove wrinkles - and it can grow new skin for plastic surgery."
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they need ijwabi to look stunning indeed, Hahahaha
I REST MY CASE!

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Aug 8, 2011

Msiphos00

But then since some of us are obsessed about witchcraft we won't allow our children to be circumcised in hospital and their skin sold, again some believe in going to the mountains
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Aug 8, 2011

OuButiMonate

matlalo uit mobaneng...
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Aug 8, 2011

Maleny

yes, foreskin will make you look young again, as you know ladies after sex they glow on thier faces, so i guess thats for single ladies.
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Aug 8, 2011

TCTLHAPI

wer are the ladies today? this ungreatful ppl they dont even bother themselves to send thanks to us
its our foreskins that makes them shine,they mustnt 4get that.b4 they spk they must start expressing some thanks to us.
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