Click here to e-mail a story to the editor.

4th Febuary 2026. Glue vs sutures.

This debate has been going on for a while but now a new Indian study of pre-school boys has been published. Only 50 boys, randomly assigned into suture or glue wound closure. Tissue glue won out handsomely, with fewer complications, fewer infectons, and better cosmetic outcome. And, of course no need to remove sutures which must be a plus for both hospital and patient.

The paper, by Soni and colleagues in Karnataka, is in Bioinformation, 21(10):3755–3759, and open access at PubMed Central. Thanks to BM for the link.

15th January 2026. Rwanda's circumcision rate quadruples.

Rwanda is one of many African countries which have initiated programmes of voluntary medical male circumcision (VMMC) to combat the HIV epidemic. A team led by Theogene Kubahoniyesu at the University of Rwanda has now analysed data from the government's Rwanda Demographic and Health Surveys to see how well it is working. "The prevalence of male circumcision among Rwandan men increased from 13.3% in 2010 to 30.6% in 2015 and further to 52.4% in 2020." That is, it almost quadrupled in 20 years. VMMC programmes in other African countries have been stalling, so this is pretty good news.

To be effective in HIV prevention circumcision needs to happen before first intercourse, and the median age for circumcision in the three surveys varied between 15 and 17. Most men reported first intercourse between age 15 and 24, which is a pretty wide band, and the median age was given as 22.4, whch seems improbably high. Maybe married men didn't want to admit to intercourse before marriage.

The English is a bit quaint - 'hazard' is used for 'likelihood' but the paper is still a preprint. Read the abstract at PubMed. The full paper is open access at AIDS Research and Therapy, but you have to download the pdf. Thanks to BM for the link.

5th January 2026. Following flood disaster in Aceh, UMY offers free circumcision.

Disastrous floods in the Aceh province of Indonesia have left many people homeless and destitute. Aceh, in Sumatra, is the most solidly Muslim province of Indonesia and as part of the humanitarian relief effort Universitas Muhammadiyah Yogyakarta (UMY) provided a free circumcision service for children in late December. The school holiday is the favourite time for this, giving the boys time to recover before school resumes. Without this initiative many would have missed out since medical facilities were destroyed, and families had no money. A morale booster more than an essential service, maybe, but morale boosting was sorely needed. Read the story at the UMY website. Thanks to regular Indonesian contributor AT for the story.

3rd January 2026. Baby dies after Islamic circumcision in England

Somehow the New Year always seems to start with bad news. 6-month-old Mohamed Abdisamad was circumcised on 12 February 2023, by a circumciser who had been recommended to his parents. At first he seemed fine but then became ill and was taken to Hillingdon Hospital in west London, where he died the same day. The cause was a Streptococcus infection. The inquest ended in October, but on 28th December Assistant Coroner Anton van Dellen issued a report calling for regulation of circumcisers. While not disagreeing with that one must note that if the NHS provided circumcision the problem would not occur. It would also save the cash-strapped NHS millioms of pounds currently spent on treating diseases which circumcision would have prevented.

The case was reported by the BBC and the Telegraph (and others). All the reports show photos of Hillingdon Hospital, as if it were to blame rather than having tried to save the boy's life. The name of the circumciser is not given so the case is presumably sub judice. Thanks to regular correspondent AK and new correspondent Alan for the news.

Click here go to Circlist’s Home Page, or use the 'Back' button of your browser to return to the previous page that you were viewing.

Copyright © 1992 - 2026, All Rights Reserved CIRCLIST.