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The practice of female genital mutilation in upper Egypt
G H Sayed1, M A Abd el-Aty, K A Fadel
1Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Faculty of Medicine, Assiut University, Egypt.
Objective:
To study the prevalence of and reasons for female genital mutilation in an Egyptian village population.
Methods:
A survey of all 819 households in an Upper Egyptian village near Assiut was conducted in 1992. The mothers of 1,732 girls under 20 years of age were interviewed to obtain information about their daughters. When possible, fathers and grandparents were also interviewed.
Results:
Respectively, 62%, 36.6% and 1.1% were girls who had undergone female genital mutilation (FGM), were to undergo the procedure and were not to have the operation. A total of 67% of the fathers of girls who had undergone FGM and 92% of their mothers were illiterate. FGM was performed most often when girls were 5-9 years old. Almost all procedures (97.5%) were performed by dayas; 1.3% were performed by barbers. A razor was used in 80.7% of the cases, and a knife in 18.5%; in less than 1% (0.7%) of the procedures were medical instruments used. The most prevalent reason for FGM was that it followed customs and traditions (77%). Serious bleeding (5.7%) and pain (3%) were the most commonly reported complications of the procedure.
Conclusions:
The study raises a number of questions about the experience of FGM by young girls, the reasons for maintaining this practice and the kinds of interventions which might be effective in eliminating it.