Kenya ramping up male circumcision efforts to meet 2015 goal

Nov 7 2012

"With just over one year left to achieve its target of having some 1.1 million men circumcised as part of HIV prevention efforts, Kenya's government is ramping up efforts to bring more men into clinics, compensating them for their time and encouraging them to bring friends in for the procedure," IRIN reports. "Kenya has carried out an estimated 477,000 circumcisions since the program started in 2008, according to the government," IRIN writes. "This figure does not include those in the private sector where voluntary medical male circumcision is also done," Walter Obiero, the clinical manager at the Nyanza Reproductive Health Society, said, the news service adds. "In 2011, UNAIDS and [PEPFAR] launched a five-year plan to have more than 20 million men in 14 eastern and southern African countries undergo medical male circumcision by 2015," IRIN notes, writing, "The government is considering integrating male circumcision, currently offered as part of its HIV prevention package, into outpatient services in public hospitals, as well as starting infant male circumcision, which studies have found to be cost-effective" (11/6).