The potential impact of mail circumcision on HIV in sub-Saharan Africa

Male circumcision could help to prevent sexually transmitted HIV

By: Williams B, Lloyd-Smith J, Gouws E & Hankins C
Published by: Public Library of Science Medicine (PLoS Medicine) , 2006
Via: Eldis

This article, from Plos medicine, considers the findings that male circumcision (MC) reduces sexual transmission of HIV from women to men and explores the implications of this finding for the promotion of MC as a public health intervention to control HIV in sub-Saharan Africa. The results of a mathematical simulation suggest that increasing MC coverage could result in 2 million HIV cases and 0.3 million deaths being avoided over the next ten years. In the ten years after that, a further 3.7 million cases and 2.7 million deaths would be prevented. The initial impact would be in men, but the reduction in the number of HIV-positive men would also lower the risk of women becoming infected. Overall, MC would reduce the rates of infection by about 37 per cent in both female-to-male and male-to-female transmission.

Although their predictions are based on the results of a single study, the authors argue that MC could substantially reduce the burden of HIV in Africa. This is especially true in southern Africa where the prevalence of MC is low but the prevalence of HIV is high. The authors conclude that while the protective benefit to HIV-negative men will be immediate, the full impact of MC on HIV-related illness and death will only be apparent in 10 to 20 years.