Current medical literature regarding neonatal circumcision is controversial and conflicting. [It is progress for a medical association to even acknowledge this. And the default position, given controversy and conflict, should be to leave the baby's penis alone.] Proponents cite potential benefits in regard to penile cancer, cervical cancer in the male's partner, sexually transmitted diseases including HIV infection, and neonatal urinary tract infections and their sequelae. Conversely other physicians are not convinced of these relationships and argue that optimal [or even ordinary] hygiene affords as much protection as circumcision. The potential benefits must be weighed against the potential risks [...including the growing risk that he will wish he still had all his penis]. The decision to perform neonatal circumcision should be based on the informed consent of the parents, and requires objective, factual counseling of parents by the family physician. [This sentence implies is it is the physician who decides, and makes no mention of the decision NOT to "perform" - or commit - neonatal circumcision.]

(1983) (1996)