Dakar, 24 October -- Participants in the 2nd African Regional Reproductive Health Task Force meeting which ended Friday in Dakar, Senegal, unanimously condemned female genital mutilation (FGM) and agreed that health workers implicated in the practice should be sanctioned by their professional associations.

Speaker after speaker at the meeting expressed concern at the "medicalisation" of FGM -- defined as the performance of female genital mutilation by doctors, nurses and midwives in clinical settings -- and asked that relevant professional associations establish a regime of sanctions against offenders to check the practice among their members.

Participants were of the view that involvement of health workers in FGM was unethical because it was contrary to their sworn commitment to positive service to humanity and should therefore be condemned in the strongest possible terms.

Earlier, in a presentation to the meeting, the Adviser on the Social Aspects of Family and Reproductive Health in the WHO African Region, Dr Djamila Cabral, stated that the medicalisation of FGM was gaining ground for several reasons such as efforts on the part the part of proponents of FGM to avert the health consequences of FGM, and greater access to health services.

She said that some health workers performing FGM sometimes did so for financial consideration, given their low remuneration.

A deep-rooted traditional practice, FGM is practiced in 27 out of the 46 countries in the WHO African Region, and prevalence of the practice varies from country to country and ranges from 5% in Niger to 99% in Guinea (Conakry).

For further information,

Media contacts: 
Samuel T. Ajibola Khalifa, Mbengue
Tel: + 47 241 39378 + 221 8 23 02 70
Mobile - 58 61 091
Email: ajibolas [at] afro.who.int ; mbengueh [at] oms.sn

Technical contact: 
Dr Doyin Oluwole 
Director, Division of Family and Reproductive Health 
Tel: +47 241 39478
Email: regafro [at] afro.who.int