Female genital mutilation: whose problem, whose solution?

doi:10.1136/bmj.333.7559.106

BMJ 2006;333:106-107 (15 July), doi:10.1136/bmj.333.7559.106

Editorial

Female genital mutilation: whose problem, whose solution?

Tackle "cosmetic" genital surgery in rich countries before criticisingtraditional practices elsewhere

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

In this week's BMJ, Elmusharaf and colleagues present a studyof the agreement between self reports of female genital mutilationand the findings of clinical examination in a cohort of girlsand another of women.¹ They report that girls and women wereinaccurate in describing what had been done to them, and thatthe actual mutilations did not readily fit into the World HealthOrganization's classification system. These findings have implicationsfor research and, more broadly, for tackling the problem offemale genital mutilation worldwide. They suggest that we needto re-examine our current conceptualisation of female genitalmutilation with a view to defining a valid and reliable definitionand classification system.

In Pokot society as in many others, genital mutilation marks entry into adulthood

The literature on female genital mutilation is long on polemicand short on data. Some writers make unsupported claims of physicaland psychological . . . [Full text of this article]

Ronán M Conroy, senior lecturer

Department of Epidemiology, Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, Dublin 2, Ireland
(rconroy@rcsi.ie)

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Female Genital Alterations: Mutilations or Modification: Lois S Bibbings
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