The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) has recently come out in support of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) and is advocating for “federal and state laws to enable pediatricians to reach out to families by offering a ‘ritual nick’,” such as pricking or minor incision of girls’ clitorises.
The AAP’s policy statement, “Ritual Genital Cutting of Female Minors”, was issued late last month (April), and according to the international human rights organization, Equality Now, represents a significant set-back to the Academy’s own prior policy statements on the issue of FGM and is antithetical to decades of noteworthy advancement across Africa and around the world, in combating this human rights violation against women and girls.
FGM is a harmful traditional practice that involves the partial or total removal of the female genitalia and is carried out across Africa, some countries in Asia and the Middle East, and by immigrants of practicing communities living around the world, including in Europe and the U.S., says Equality Now. It is estimated that up to 140 million women and girls around the world are affected by FGM. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services estimated in 1997 that over 168,000 girls and women living in the U.S. have either been, or are at risk of being, subjected to FGM.
FGM is a form of gender-based violence and discrimination that is performed on girls to control their sexuality in womanhood, guarantee their acceptance into a particular community, and safeguard their virginity until marriage. Taina Bien-Aime, Equality Now’s Executive Director explains, “Encouraging pediatricians to perform FGM under the notion of ‘cultural sensitivity’ shows a shocking lack of understanding of a girl’s fundamental right to bodily integrity and equality. The AAP should promote awareness-raising within FGM-practicing immigrant communities about the harms of the practice, instead of endorsing an internationally recognized human rights violation against girls and women.”
Equality Now says the AAP’s proposition that offers to “nick girls” genitalia is problematic and troubling and represents a retreat from the Academy’s 1998 policy statement on the issue. The World Health Organization and the International Federation of Gynecology and Obstetrics have unequivocally opposed FGM as a “medically unnecessary” practice, and it is widely recognized that all types of FGM are a form of gender-based violence.
Advocates also fear that mothers who have until now resisted community pressure and not subjected their daughters to FGM in the U.S., in part because of the anti-FGM law, could be forced under the AAP guidelines to ask pediatricians to “nick” their daughters’ clitorises if it is legally permitted.
The international human rights organization is calling on the AAP to revoke its statement, which comes at a time when several African and European countries have noted the increasing dangers of medicalization of FGM and specifically ban medical personnel from performing any form of FGM.
