Mass circumcision party held for hundreds of boys in the Philippines

Preteen Filippino boys queued in their hundreds for a daylong 'circumcision party', which officials hope will earn their city a place in the record books, as doctors carried out the surgery on dozens of makeshift operating tables in a stadium in Marikina city, east of Manila.



In the Philippines, circumcision is a rite of passage most males undergo as preteens. Young Filippino boys are traditionally circumcised during their school summer break from March to May.

Officials said the event, touted in a press statement as a 'circumcision party', aimed to promote safe circumcision. They offered poor residents free surgery that would otherwise cost at least $40 (£25) in private hospitals. In rural areas, the surgery is sometimes performed by non-doctors using crude methods.



Marikina city officials hope to establish a world record for the number of people attending a mass circumcision. The vice mayor, Jose Fabian Cadiz, said: 'We applied for the Guinness Book of World Records and we are recording everything so we can send all the data to them and hopefully it will be recognized.'