Two staff at Pallisa general government hospital are on the run over the death of 4 months old boy after undegoing circumcision.
According to Emily Alaso, the North Bukedi police regional public relation officer, the baby died due to convulsions. A convulsion is condition in which muscles contract and relax quickly and cause uncontrolled shaking of the body.
According to the police, the health workers whose names are withheld circumcised the boy and as the mother went away with him just a few meters from the hospital, the baby got convulsions and she brought him back to the hospital.
The medics put the patient on the oxygen but he died that is when they took off after for the fear of being arrested. Alaso says that police is still hunting for the health workers who if arrested, will be charged with neglect of duties causing the death of the boy.
MThe government officially started the free circumcision programme in September 2010 after promising results of randomised trials—in 2005 and 2007 — conducted in Uganda, Kenya and South Africa showed that medical male circumcision reduced the risk of contracting the HIV virus by up to 60 per cent.
This followed the launch of an HIV/Aids policy that officially added circumcision to the traditional ABC-abstinence, faithfulness and use of condom approach. The safe circumcision policy aims at providing circumcision to 40 per cent of Ugandan men aged 14-49 over a five year period. Currently only 25 per cent of Ugandan men between the ages of 15 and 55 years are circumcised, according to the demographic and health survey.
Health experts also say men who have been circumcised have a low risk of contracting urinary tract infections and penile cancer. But officials warn that such health benefits should not excite men into leading sexually reckless lives after circumcision, stressing that it only provides partial protection.
