Men, women and children protested in front of the American Academy of Obstetricians and Gynecologists annual convention throughout the week to signal their opposition to male circumcision.

Every 28 seconds a baby boy is circumcised in the United States, according to a study by Dan Bollinger, director of the International Coalition for Genital Integrity. The coalition is an alliance of organizations dedicated to protecting the normal anatomy of males, females and intersexed children.

Circumcision is the surgical removal of the foreskin from the penis. In the United States, it is most commonly performed – without anesthesia - by obstetricians on newborn babies, though it can be done in a ceremony days or years after birth in some religions.

The study also states that in 1971, the American Academy of Pediatrics reported there were no valid medical indications, or reasons for treatment, for circumcision. Still, more than half of newborn boys were circumcised before leaving the hospital in 2003, according to statistics from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Mike Keith helped organize the protest in front of the Moscone Center in San Francisco this week. Keith said some of the reasons circumcisions are still performed on more than half of American baby boys are because the procedure is profitable and it is regarded as normal. Even though it is a cosmetic procedure, he said, many doctors no longer cover it through health insurance.

Not only is there little evidence to suggest circumcision is medically necessary, it is the most commonly practiced surgery in America, according to a study done by Dr. Gerald Weiss of the American Board of Surgery.

The practice dates back hundreds of years and is still practiced by Christians, Muslims and Jews as a religious rite, as well as for aesthetic reasons. The National Center for Biotechnology Information estimates that one third of males worldwide are circumcised.

Many California health insurance plans don’t cover the procedure, which makes it profitable for doctors, according to many of the protesters.

Kamal Harb, a sexual health educator at SF State, said there is a slight increase in the risk of contracting sexually transmitted diseases in men who aren't circumcised.

But Harb added that the risk is widely debated. Harb said many people who object to circumcision disagree with the practice for a variety of reasons, including the pain of the procedure and the loss of the nerve-filled foreskin, which could reduce sexual sensation.

Greg Dervin, a graduate student, started SF State’s chapter of Students for Genital Integrity, the first college group dedicated to stopping any cutting of children's genitalia. Dervin said he supports the protesters despite his Jewish upbringing.

The religious ceremony practiced by many Jews is called a brit milah (“covenant of circumcision” in Hebrew) or more commonly, a bris, or “covenant” in Yiddish.

Gillian Flato and Norm Cohen are part of a group called Jews Against Circumcision who also protested at the convention. Cohen said they wanted to inform other Jews of alternatives to circumcision.
"There is a choice, even for Jews,” Flato said.

UC Berkeley Ph.D. student Tina Kimmel protested with another group of activists called BANG, or Bay Area iNtactivists. She said BANG represents a worldwide movement for the need to end circumcision.
Kimmel said the group was at the convention because they wanted to talk to the folks responsible for most of the circumcisions in the United States.

Both Kimmel and Mike Keith wore shirts that said "circumcision sexually mutilates" and "circumcision amputates 50 percent or more of penile nerves.”

They said most doctors avoided them, but doctors from outside of the United States expressed support for their cause.

In both the United Kingdom and Canada, circumcision is practiced among less than 20 percent of the population according to the Circumcision Information and Resource Pages.

"We're not crazy if the rest of the world agrees with us,” Flato said.