On 26 June, Mohammed Alazawi, a bogus, self-proclaimed “doctor” thought to have conducted dozens of unlawful circumcisions of Muslim baby boys, will appear at Southwark Crown Court for sentencing. Judge Gregory Perrins, who presided over the trial at which Alazawi was convicted last month of six counts of fraud, six of wounding with intent and one of causing actual bodily harm, has called on the Government to change the law to protect the vulnerable, saying circumcision for religious reasons is “almost entirely unregulated”.

This was the second such case in less than six months. In January, Mohammad Siddiqui was jailed for five years and seven months at the Inner London Crown Court for causing “painful cruelty” to 23 children, some of whom were left “screaming in agony”. Here, too, the trial judge said “safeguards and protections must now be put in place as a matter of urgency” to ensure Muslim and Jewish babies are protected.

Now it can be revealed that responses made under the Freedom of Information Act by the General Medical Council suggest the damage being caused by “MNTC” — male non-therapeutic circumcision — is more widespread than realised. Last year, the GMC received complaints against eight separate doctors relating to this practice. They included cases described by the GMC as “doctor-performed circumcision which has left patient with a mutilated penis”, “doctor-supervised circumcision where a child almost lost their life”, and “doctor-performed substandard circumcision that caused injury to a child”. In another case, a “doctor carried out circumcision substandardly leading to hypospadias” — a condition that affects fertility and sexual function in which the urethral opening lies on the underside of the penis, instead of its tip.

It is likely that these cases represent only a fraction of the total number of instances where child circumcision goes wrong. The uncomfortable truth, which the two judges must have had in mind when they made their comments, is that MNTC is not regulated at all if carried out by those who are not medically qualified.

Siddiqui was once a doctor, but was struck off by the GMC back in 2015 because of shortcomings in the way he ran a “mobile circumcision service”, which he continued despite no longer being registered. At his trial, the court was told he used unsterilised, rusty instruments. According to the Crown Prosecution Service, he “practised these circumcising acts in an unsafe and unsanitary environment, and so meted out painful cruelty to children leaving them with emotional and physical scars”.

Alazawi, meanwhile, had no medical training, but falsely claimed to have qualified at a hospital in Jordan, telling police after his arrest that he was a “circumcision expert and taxi driver”. He advertised his service, for which he charged £40, by leaving leaflets in mosques.

The only political party attuned to this issue seems to be the Liberal Democrats. Twice this year, its health spokesman Lord Scriven has tried to raise it in the House of Lords, but on both occasions the Government has shown no interest in taking action. In March, Scriven asked justice minister Lord Ponsonby how the Government intended to deal with the call for regulation made by the judge in the Siddiqui case. The reply? That it had “no responsibility” for regulating NTMC, and while ministers “sympathised” with those who experienced “harm or trauma”, they were also aware that many parents wanted their male children to undergo the procedure for religious and cultural reasons. Ponsonby’s only concrete suggestion was that if so, they should first consult their GP.

Scriven tried again in April, asking health minister Baroness Meron which regulations existed for those without medical qualifications performing NTMC. She responded: “There is no legal requirement for an individual undertaking male circumcision to be medically trained or to have proven expertise […] Non-medically trained individuals carrying out NTMC are outside the scope of the Care Quality Commission’s regulation.”

Perhaps the new Freedom of Information Act figures provided by the GMC, made in response to a request by the National Secular Society’s Dr Alejandro Sanchez, may prompt officials to act. “If circumcisions carried out by medical professionals nearly killed one child and left another’s penis mutilated, the injuries inflicted by unregulated non-medics are likely to be even worse,” he told UnHerd. “Circumcision is a surgery. Surgeries are inherently dangerous. They should only be performed on children by doctors, and only with medical necessity.”

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David Rose is UnHerd‘s Investigations Editor.

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