African Pastors Lead Crusade for Circumcision
The same survey revealed that the prevalence rate among adult Kenyans aged 15 to 64 was 7.1 percent. The report revealed that the prevalence was higher among uncircumcised men (13.2 percent) than among circumcised men (3.9 percent). Peak HIV prevalence among uncircumcised men was among those men aged 30-39 (29.7 percent).
Many regional variations exist. Nyanza Province in western Kenya has the lowest prevalence of male circumcision (47 percent) and the highest HIV rate (15.3 percent). Nyanza is the first province to implement the male circumcision program. Its goal is to increase the proportion of circumcised males in the target age bracket from 47 percent to 80 percent by 2013. This translates into 84,000 circumcisions a year.
In light of this intensive new program, George Karambuka and his family recently expanded their outreach beyond Nairobi. They are bringing with them one of their most meaningful new family traditions: Every January, they go together for an HIV test in memory of his late wife and his children's mother. Karambuka said this gesture makes visible the African saying about HIV: "All are not infected, but all are affected."
Moses Wasamu, based in Nairobi, Kenya, is associate editor of Christian Times, Juba, South Sudan. Additional reporting by CT news intern Bryn Sandberg.
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H. D. Schmidt
What a so called Christian Disaster that is making Jesus once again weep! For God's sake and a disaster that will make Christianity look evil!
Ronald Callender
I'm deeply sorry to hear about the devastation taking place in Africa owing to HIV/AIDS. This issue shows that all of us really need Jesus. He's the solution for all of our problems: external and internal and visible and invisible. The foregoing and reading that Jesus was circumcised make me wonder: is the campaign to circumcise people to prevent further cases of HIV/AIDS an effort to go back under the Old Testament Law of God, the Ten Commandments? I ask that question because if circumcision was highly effective against the spreading of those diseases, how come it's not the biggest in thing in North America? In fact, to date, I have not heard of people getting circumcised to prevent these diseases in North America. Have the leaders of the circumcision campaign spent time reviewing the research and secured other experts to verify the research before adopting it? The best prescription for the prevention of HIV/AIDS is the doctrine of Jesus. I'll be praying for all involved.