Circumcision found to reduce cervical cancer in partners
The Jerusalem Post, By Judy Siegel, April, 14 2002
(April 14) - For the first time, circumcision has been scientifically proven to significantly reduce the incidence of cervical cancer in men's sexual partners, according to yesterday's issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.
A connection has been suspected for years - mostly because of the unusually low rate of cervical cancer among Israeli women, whose partners are almost always circumcised.
The study, carried out by the International Agency for Research on Cancer and led by Dr. Xavier Castellsagu, provides clear-cut proof of the benefits of circumcision to women partners.
Cervical cancer almost always results from infections in the woman of human papillomavirus (HPV). Men who suffer from penile HPV can infect their partners during sex. Abnormal cervical cells can be detected by a Pap smear and treated if discovered early.
Asked to comment, Prof. Tamar Peretz, director of the Sharett Institute of Oncology at Hadassah-University Hospital, Ein Kerem, in Jerusalem, said the study is important because there has been no proof until now of the link between circumcision - increasingly opposed in Europe and elsewhere because baby boys suffer pain and "have not been asked" for permission - and much-reduced risks of cervical cancer in their eventual partners. She said that apparently, HPV hides in the penile folds of skins of non-circumcised men and is passed on to their partners.
Researchers from the Nether-lands, Brazil, the Philippines, Thailand, Costa Rica, France, and Spain, pooled data on 1,913 couples from five countries enrolled in seven studies of cervical cancer. DNA tests were conducted to note the presence or absence of penile HPV, which was detected in 166 of the 847 uncircumcised men (19.6 percent) and in 16 of the 292 circumcised men (5.5%).
After adjusting for age at first intercourse, lifetime number of sexual partners and other potential confounders, circumcised men were found less likely than uncircumcised men to have HPV infection.
Monogamous women whose male partners had six or more sexual partners and were circumcised had a significantly lower risk of cervical cancer than women whose partners were uncircumcised.
Affair led to mother murdering her own kids
Days after buying another woman Valentine's Day flowers, a Sydney father came home to find a trail of blood leading him to the bodies of his two young children lying next to their mother, a court has been told.
Australian Associated Press
Aug 24 2009
The woman had given the couple's three-year-old daughter and four-year-old son rat poison and an unidentified pink liquid before smothering them and killing them, court papers said.
She then tried to take her own life, the NSW Supreme Court was told.
Doctors agree the mother, from Canley Heights in Sydney's west, was suffering from "major depression" when she poisoned her children on February 19 last year.
She has pleaded not guilty to the two murders by reason of mental illness.
As her judge-alone trial began, the mother's lawyer told Justice Clifton Hoeben his client didn't think life was worth living after learning about her husband's affair.
American Psychological Association
Dating Violence Statistics in the United States
Nearly one in 10 girls and one in 20 boys say they have been raped or experienced some other form of abusive violence on a date, according to a study released Sunday at the annual meeting of the American Psychological Association.
Teen depression on the increase
More and More teens are becoming depressed. The numbers of young people suffering from depression in the last 10 years has risen worryingly, an expert says.
BBC, UK, August 3, 2004
Government statistics suggest one in eight adolescents now has depression.
Unless doctors recognise the problem, Read More ..uld slip through the net, says Professor Tim Kendall of the National Collaborating Centre for Mental Health.
Guidelines on treating childhood depression will be published next year. Professor Kendall says a lot Read More ..eds to be done to treat the illness.
Woman convicted of killing 3 kids after custody battle
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS, USA, August 26, 2008
HELSINKI, Finland - A court in Finland has convicted a woman of murdering her three young children and has given her a life sentence.
The Espoo District Court says Thai-born Yu-Hsiu Fu was found guilty of strangling her 8-year-old twin daughters and 1-year-old son in her home.
She tried to kill herself afterward.
The verdict on Tuesday says the 41-year-old woman was found to be of sound mind at the time of the murders.
Court papers show the murders were preceded by a bitter custody battle with her Finnish husband who was living separately from her at the time of the murders.
A life sentence in Finland mean convicts usually serve at least 11 years in prison.
New Brunswick woman ruled responsible in burning of baby's body
ST. STEPHEN, N.B. - A New Brunswick judge says a woman who burned and dismembered her newborn son is criminally responsible for her actions.
Becky Sue Morrow earlier pleaded guilty to offering an indignity to a dead body and disposing of a newborn with the intent of concealing a delivery.
Judge David Walker ruled Friday that the 27-year-old woman may have been suffering from a mental disorder when she delivered the baby but that that was not the case when the baby's body was burned and its remains hidden.
It is not known if the baby was alive at the time of birth.
At a hearing last month, the court heard contrasting reports from the two psychiatrists. One said Ms. Morrow was in a "disassociated" mental state when the crime occurred. The other said she clearly planned her actions and understood the consequences.