to CELEBRATE the first FGM prosecutions!

[Sallyingforth]

Breaking news on BBC. Hope they send them down for a long sentence as an example to others.

Perhpas it's easier to understand if you compare it to male circumcision, which is widely accepted.

Although FMG is more damaging, the concept is the same.

I suppose because male is generally done to babies (although I am sure I have read reports of boys being cut much later) whereas it seems to ve always done on much older girls, with violence and threats and so much fear and trauma.

Is male circumcism mainly done at birth say in the Jewish religion?

I'm not advocating it unless it is necessary for medical reasons. I remember someone needing the op when he was about 19 and being very embarrassed.

When it is does without the consent of the child/young adult it is so wrong and the female one seems worse as it is totally unecessary. With men it seems to be quite common for medical reasons.

it's not the same ffs
male circumsision might be medically indicated, fgm never ever is.

If its done for religious reasons (jewish/muslim) it is when they are days old by 'professionals' not some old bat with a dirty razor blade.

I don't agree with it being done to males or females. If the Great Almighty is so Great, why make such a basic design fault?

absolutely agree Mousmous and it needs to be stopped.

alemci Clitoridectomy was a 'treatment' for nymphomania during the Victorian period, but don't know when it started or stopped.

...who can encourage them and their families to consent to reversal surgery. But informed consent is required - if they refuse there's nothing we can do but deal with the situation in labour.

Traffic - so if the woman cannot be persuaded to consent to reversal and the surgeon has had to open the area to permit the birth, what happens then? How do you 'deal with the situation in labour'?

If she won't consent to the reversal surely all the surgeon can do is to close the cut he has made? He cannot reverse the FGM without her consent. He cannot leave her bleeding on the oprating table.

The surgeon is in a lose lose situation.

And that's what makes this such a very poor test case.

I thought women were locked away in mental asylums for promiscuity. They probably were too...

LazyJaney do you think any other form of GBH should be allowed on the NHS as well, to save some poor thug a criminal record? Some forms of violence are illegal for a really good reason.

mpousmous

"it's not the same ffs
male circumsision might be medically indicated, fgm never ever is."

In many cases it is the same though. Uneccesary male genital mutilation is routinely done babies. The fact that it may or may not be necessary later in life does not change the premise.

so if the woman cannot be persuaded to consent to reversal and the surgeon has had to open the area to permit the birth, what happens then? How do you 'deal with the situation in labour'?

Don't know if it is standard or not, but the cases I know of had C-sections.

As said above "Traffic - so if the woman cannot be persuaded to consent to reversal and the surgeon has had to open the area to permit the birth, what happens then? How do you 'deal with the situation in labour'?
If she won't consent to the reversal surely all the surgeon can do is to close the cut he has made? He cannot reverse the FGM without her consent. He cannot leave her bleeding on the operating table.
The surgeon is in a lose lose situation.
And that's what makes this such a very poor test case."

That is why I want to know the technical details. Did he stick up the cut? Is he obliged to make the opening larger than it was before the birth? I wonder if there are official UK medical guidelines for NHS doctors on this.

To me though the FGM seems a controlling traumatic violent event which is made against their free wishes.

At least when it is done to a baby they cannot remember it. Why do they not do it when the girls are babies or is it supposedly ineffective then?

Is part of it the subjugation and humiliation and we elders know best attitude towards the young girls/women? and us men are better than you etc

On the facts we have so far, I am concerned that this doesn't look like the strongest case but at least a prosecution is happening. It does seem that the charge is predicated upon his reinfubulating. I went on the GMC Register and was a bit to see that he is still allowed to practice without any restrictions - I would have expected that at the very least, he would have had conditions placed on his practice whilst the case is heard. Also, he is at the most, a doctor in training and I would have expected that faced with a patient like this should have sought advice from his consultant as to what to do in this situation. Perhaps he did? He's still professionally responsible for his actions whatever he did.

alemci, it tends to be women doing it and wanting it for their grandchidlren so I am not sure we can blame men, although the purpose around is if you don't have a clitoris and your vagina is basically stitched up you're not so likely to sleep around I suppose so about control of girls in effect by men (although as some people have said on the thread above there are various forms of if which are not all identical).

Bourdic, what would he have done to reinfibulate? Does that mean he sews her up inside as well as externally sewing back an external cut or is it there was a flat of skin after birth and he sewed that over most of the vaginal opening?

GillTheGiraffe I have already explained in great detail and linked to professional sites what is done after birth. Please look at the picures and read the guidelines which explain the treatment.

If a woman arrives at labour ward and is found to have FGM involving infibulation she is advised to have an anterior episiotomy (ie to be cut open) to avoid catastrophic tissue damage. Sometimes the tissue is so scarred and resistant to stretching that without this the baby is physically head butting it and there is no other way past the obstruction. In countries where FGM is common, babies die from obstructed labour and women frequently suffer obstetric fistulae, ending up with holes between their vagina and rectum and incontinent. The women seem to accept the opening as normal and necessary - they have often had to be cut open by their husband to allow penetrative sex. But she has to consent to this or suffer the consequences.

However, as reinfibulation is illegal she will be informed that it will not be performed. The sides of the cut tissue are sutured over to stop bleeding but they are not joined together again. If she is mentally competent she is able to accept or refuse any or all treatment. It's not up to the doctor to decide to flaut the law and his professional code of practice.

It's not the ideal situation to be having an in depth discussion but sometimes that's what we have to deal with. You really need to make yourself aware of the specifics of the law and professional regulations.

From BMA guidance on FGM

In many communities, including those based in the UK, custom demands that a woman be re-infibulated after each childbirth. Re-infibulation is illegal. The Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists clinical guidelines state that:
“Any repair carried out after birth, whether following spontaneous laceration or deliberate defibulation, should be sufficient to appose raw edges and control bleeding, but must not result in a vaginal opening
16 that makes intercourse difficult or impossible.”

Jane why do you keep asking the same questions and refuse to read the explanations?

Trafficwarden thank you so much for your suggestion that I look at the RCN guidelines. The quote from Lord Lamy sums it up nicely for me :

^The basic requirement that children are kept safe is universal and
cuts across cultural boundaries.Every child living in this country is
entitled to be given the protection of the law,regardless of his or her
background.Cultural heritage is important to many people, but it
cannot take precedence over standards of care embodied in law.^

I am very happy with that principle. For those of us who are not in possession of the facts of the case it seems rather silly to speculate on details of which we have no real knowledge.

but why do these women want to do it to their grandchildren Jane would be my question.

for their future husbands. how magnanimous of these perpetrators to put their not even in existence dhs wishes before their own flesh and blood.

also all this is making child birth a nightmare for these poor women.

traffic, I am finding all the responses very helpful. Thank you.
So it seems that this doctor allegedly has not just sewn her back up but has in effect gone inside and sewn the sides of the vaginal wall back up more than would naturally be the case and that that is illegal.

Why do grandmothers want it done in those countries abroad? Ignorance. Thinking she won't be a proper woman without it or won't get a husband?

I doubt it makes sex better for the men, probably worse. So just as we find that telling teenagers that smoking means no one will kiss you (message that works on them better than talking of cancer risks) telling the men that if this is done to girls sex for men is much worse might be part of the solution.

Jane You are being deliberately obtuse. None of us know exactly what the doctor is alleged to have done except it was a form of FGM.

Infibulation, the third type described in the WHO statement which you have previously referred to, has been described in detail.
The reinstatement or reversal of infibulation has also been described in detail.
Links to pictures and diagrams of all these procedures have been provided.
The law statute has been linked to.
All your questions have been answered in excrutiating detail and you are STILL talking about vaginas being tightened.
If you can't be bothered to avail yourself of the information you asked for, please stop wasting our time asking the same thing repeatedly and suggesting increasingly bizarre scenarios.

So the doctor was either oblivious to this guidance, or aware of it but flouted the guidance under intimidation/ pressure from another person.

I can see that the only thing this will achieve is that C section will become the normal mode of delivery of babies to women who have undergone FGM. Surgeons won't risk the possibility of prosecution by attempting a vaginal delivery.

This does absolutely nothing to persuade those who procure the initial FGM to stop doing so. It's just a scape-goating someone who was just dealing with its aftermath.

You know I find it quite incredible, having read some of the earlier posts, that the first time a clinician may become aware that the woman has an obstructive form of FGM is during labour itself.
We have birth plans for scented candles, whale music and fuck knows what else, but no one has actually had a peek down there to make sure the baby has an exit route? I would have put that pretty high up the list on any birth plan. Surely that's part of the normal risk assessment that HCPs should be carry out way before due date, if only to ensure the necessary interventations are in place at time of labour?