In Reply.—I would like to reinforce Dr Gellis' plea for more vigorous efforts to discourage routine circumcision.1 I also recently had a case of staphylococcal scalded skin syndrome2 in a 2-week-old infant who had been circumcised shortly after birth and in whom penile infection developed. After parenteral treatment in the hospital, he has recovered uneventfully.
Nonreligious routine circumcision in the United States is currently a tradition without ritual. It has neither medical nor spiritual nor psychological benefits. Even parents who automatically sign consent forms for circumcision in hospitals do so, I believe, with reluctance. They do not want their son to experience pain, but they think that circumcision, like immunization, is an important health procedure. Of course, physicians have supported this notion for years (and executed the procedure), so it is not surprising that it remains ingrained in our culture.
How do you begin to alter such