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14-Sept-2009 - NORM-UK welcomes Professor Jack Cohen
A prominent reproductive biologist has thrown his weight behind NORM-UK, the charity concerned with the male foreskin and campaigning for personal choice in circumcision.

Professor Jack Cohen, who has an academic career spanning 55 years, has co-authored books with Terry Pratchett and worked as a consultant on science fiction productions, joins actor Alan Cumming and art critic Brian Sewell as a patron of the charity.

Speaking as an honoured guest at the charity's annual general meeting in Staffordshire, Professor Cohen said. "I'm delighted to join NORM-UK, to help to raise public awareness of the very real issues around male circumcision."

"As a tissue researcher in Boston in 1963-4 I became known as the prepuce man, collecting 400 infant foreskins for experimentation in one year (sometimes from parents who had fainted after watching the surgery on their son). Now it seems this poacher has turned gamekeeper!"

"Although I circumcised my first two sons", he added, "I have increasingly questioned the practice, and its origins. I support the principle that every man and woman has the right to veto alterations of their body. Unfortunately in its early historical form circumcision was designed to weed out and ostracise those who resisted authority –denying them the right to reproduce. Thus the harm has become deeply entrenched with questioning seen as an aberration. I’m happy to see this is beginning to change."

Asked whether the African circumcision experiments should sway parents who are questioning circumcision, Professor Cohen said, "There are still no good grounds for believing that circumcision will protect a boy from HIV in the future. The small numbers who were apparently protected by surgery in the trials don't justify the policy conclusions drawn, particularly when they stand in contrast to population evidence, in Africa and elsewhere."

Dr John Warren, Chairman of NORM-UK commented, "We are delighted to have Professor Cohen as a supporter of our work, and we concur with his view of the African HIV experiments. Parents who think circumcising might reduce their child’s risk of HIV should ask, why should Israel have the same HIV rate as Sweden when one is almost entirely circumcised and one almost entirely not circumcised? They should also ask whether they can be sure of his future sexuality. There is no evidence that circumcision protects gay men at all and in fact in Britain a circumcised gay man is 20% more likely to report having been diagnosed HIV+ than a gay man who has not been circumcised."
--Ends--

--Contact--
Laura MacDonald/David Smith at NORM-UK Tel: 01785 814044 Email: media@norm-uk.org
Professor Jack Cohen Tel: 01531 822432 Email: drcohen@drjackcohen.net

--Notes for Editors--
* The Annual General Meeting of NORM-UK was held in Stone, Staffordshire on Saturday September 12th. Other speakers included Peter Bolton who has written a philosophy dissertation on the ethics of infant male circumcision, and Dr Anthony Lempert of the Secular Medical Forum.
* A number of photographs from the event are available for use.
* Professor Cohen is pictured at the NORM-UK AGM with a banner for the Genital Autonomy campaign, in which NORM-UK is a partner along with FORWARD, the British organisation concerned with female genital cutting

--About Professor Jack Cohen--
Jack Cohen worked for Birmingham University’s Zoology Department for 30 years More recently at Warwick University, he bridged the Ecosystems Unit of the Biology Dept and the Mathematics Institute, and his brief included bringing more science to more public awareness – one of his key interests. In the mid 90s he was visiting professor at the Weizmann Institute, Israel.

Professor Cohen has published about 120 research papers. His books include Living Embryos (Pergamon, 1963, 1967, 1980), a classic textbook that sold more than 100,000 copies; Reproduction (Butterworth's); Spermatozoa, Antibodies and Infertility (Blackwell); The Privileged Ape (Parthenon), a rather different look at human evolution.
Professor Cohen now works with the mathematician Ian Stewart (Does God Play Dice? and the 1997-8 Royal Institution Christmas Lectures) with whom he has explored issues of complexity, chaos and simplicity. Their first joint book, The Collapse of Chaos, was published by Viking/Penguin ('94, re-issued 2000), and their Figments of Reality: the evolution of the curious mind (Cambridge University Press) was published in ’97. Both authors cooperated with Terry Pratchett on popular Discworld titles.

--ABOUT NORM-UK--
* NORM-UK was founded in 1995 and gained charity status in 1998. The charity aims to raise the awareness of the function and value of the foreskin, the risks of circumcision and the non or less invasive alternatives.
* In 2008 with FORWARD, the British organisation concerned with female genital cutting, and The Tasmanian Children’s Commissioner Paul Mason, NORM-UK launched the Genital Autonomy Campaign, arguing that non-therapeutic genital surgery is a personal choice which can only be made in adulthood. For more information see http://www.genitalautonomy.org
* NORM-UK is presently funded entirely by personal donations, is run by one full time member of staff and an army of determined volunteers.
* The website at www.norm-uk.org provides a wealth of information and has been verified as compliant with the Health on the Net (HON) code of medical ethics since 2003.
* Since 1995 NORM-UK has received over 5000 letters and emails from men unhappy about their circumcision.
* NORM-UK is a member of the Men's Health Forum (MHF), the Alliance for Transforming the Lives of Children (ATLC), and the International Coalition for Genital Integrity (ICGI).
* NORM-UK has no formal connection or affiliation with the US-based National Organisation of Restoring Men (NORM) and this acronym is no longer used by NORM-UK.

--ABOUT CIRCUMCISION AND HIV--
An HIV rate of 0.1% is reported in Israel and in Sweden. Factsheets on HIV by country can be found at: http://www.unaids.org/en/KnowledgeCentre/HIVData/Epidemiology/epifactsheets.asp
A useful summary of HIV by country can be found at:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_HIV/AIDS_adult_prevalence_rate

The National Gay Men's Sex Survey in 2001 by Sigma Research found that HIV rates were 6.1% among British gay men who were circumcised and 5% among British gay men who were not circumcised. The report is found at: http://www.sigmaresearch.org.uk/downloads/report02d.pdf