Female Genital Circumcision

Female Genital Circumcision (FGC)

Also known as Female Genital Mutilation (FGM)

These are links to find out more about FGC/FGM:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/2736067.stm

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2005/jun/01/health.healthandwellbeing

http://www.religioustolerance.org/fem_cirm.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Female_genital_cutting

Can it be reversed? Some people seem to think so and are doing something about it. See the links under the associated quotes below:

· “The only midwife in the UK to practice reversals of FGM, Momoh finds that in half of the cases she deals with, it is possible to find the clitoris. “Often the clitoris is just there when you peel the scar tissue back, maybe because when it was done, the child had not developed,” she says. “When I can reverse FGM it makes me so very happy.”

http://www.stophonourkillings.com/?name=News&file=print&sid=805

· “An estimated 15,000 girls in the UK are considered to be at risk of FGM. The majority of these ore in families who are settled in inner-city areas, for example, London, Birmingham and Cardiff. A good example of a local level response is the North West London African/Somali Well Women Clinic, which was set up by the Central Middlesex Hospitals Trust. The clinic provides comprehensive care, including, for example, surgery to repair and sometimes reverse damage caused by FGM...”

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2872/is_2_27/ai_75099772/pg_11

· “Thousands of women a year are presenting to medical and community staff in Britain with problems resulting from genital mutilation. There are 12 specialist FGM clinics across the country within the NHS, and hundreds of operations are being carried out to reverse the most extreme form (type 3) in which girls are stitched almost closed.”

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2005/jun/01/health.healthandwellbeing

· “Mutilated women will often travel across the country to attend clinics known to have sympathetic and well-informed staff. Harry Gordon worked with Forward to start the first specialist clinic in the UK in 1993, and is now consultant in charge of the African women's clinic at Central Middlesex hospital. He has carried out more than 300 reversals of type 3 FGM.”

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2005/jun/01/health.healthandwellbeing

I hope you use my research to start your own research project on the issue. Also here’s the contact info for Central Middlesex Hospital, which was mentioned on more than one occasion during my research.

Acton Lane Park Royal
London
NW10 7NHS

Main Tel: 020 8965 5733