Amazon cuts circumcision ‘training kit’ over fears it could encourage DIY jobs
Online shopping empire Amazon has cut a controversial doll from its UK digital store. A model of a baby boy’s lifelike crotch, complete with the tools to practice circumcision operations at home, has been discontinued.
The “infant circumcision training kit” has been pulled after the National Secular Society (NSS) wrote to Amazon, concerned that the lifelike kit would encourage some parents to attempt the procedure on their child at home.
The kit, which comes in a range of skin colors, has multiple baby penises complete with realistic foreskin made from soft, lifelike material to be pliable, delicate, and realistic to the touch.
The £365 ($487) kit is designed for doctors and medical students, and comes with scalpels and scissors.
Sold by a third party firm called Educational and Scientific Products (ESP), the kit is designed for “medical students, physicians and other practitioners” to learn and practice circumcisions “without the worry of learning on a live patient.”
“Anything we sell is for educational purposes and our main customers are universities, colleges, hospitals and GPs,” a spokesman for ESP said. “It is all for professional use and they are all training aids.”
The NSS is strictly against circumcision (unless getting the cut is for medical reasons). The group wants the government to ban “non-consensual, non-therapeutic” circumcisions on children too young to give their consent.
“Male circumcision in the UK is wholly unregulated and we fear that the sale of this product may encourage unqualified practitioners to carry out unnecessary surgery on infants in non-clinical conditions, resulting in serious harm,” chairman of the NSS medical forum Antony Lempert told the Guardian.
“Non-therapeutic circumcision is unethical and unnecessary and is putting infant boys at risk of death and serious injury,” he added. “This practice could be encouraged by the morally negligent sale of infant circumcision training kits to the public.”
