NOCIRC OF AUSTRALIA

George Williams

Presented at the Fourth International Symposium on Sexual Mutilations,
University of Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland, August 9-11, 1996.

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NOCIRC of Australia was officially launched on 8 August 1993 by founding members Dr. George Williams, John Fleming and John Shanahan. The founding members, independent activists for many years, formed NOCIRC to campaign against unnecessary circumcision by encouraging informed medical and legal debate on the subject, and by promoting the availability of scientifically based information for new parents making the "circumcision decision." The directors take comfort in the rapidly declining incidence of routine male circumcision of infants, and NOCIRC will therefore will assist and support the policies of The Australian Medical Association, the Australian College of Paediatrics and the NSW Health Department. The NOCIRC directors remain concerned that the prevalence of male circumcision is unacceptably high compared to Scandinavian countries, France, Italy and New Zealand, are alarmed by the fact that female genital mutilation is practiced by a variety of cultural groups in Australia.

[The complete paper is published in Sexual Mutilations: A Human Tragedy, New York: Plenum Press, 1997 (ISBN 0-306-45589-7).]

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George Williams, M.B, Ch.B., F.R.A.C.P., Consultant Pediatrician and Perinatalogist, is a childbirth and parent educator who served as the Director of Newborn Intensive Care Unit at the Children's Hospital in Sydney, where he now has a private practice. Dr. Williams has been an anti-circumcision activist for 14 years and is the founder and co-director of NOCIRC of Australia, P. O. Box 248, Menai Central, NSW 2234. He has appeared on national radio and television and has contributed to many media publications on circumcision.

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