The study followed over 340,000 boys in Denmark and results showed that the chances of developing ASD increased by 46 percent if males were circumcised before the age of 10 and doubled if done before the age of 5.
The article, published on The Mirror's UK website, states that scientists think there is a link between the pain caused by the procedure and ASD.
Professor Morten Frisch, of the Statens Serum Institut, Copenhagen, who led the research, said: “Our investigation was prompted by the combination of recent animal findings linking a single painful injury to lifelong deficits in stress response and a study showing a strong, positive correlation between a country’s neonatal male circumcision rate and its prevalence of ASD in boys.”
In our cover story on the startling rates of newborn male circumcision in Michigan, we spoke with mothers, doctors, and anti-circumcision activists about the pain that baby boys feel during the procedure. While a topical ointment penetrates a few layers of skin, infants can generally feel everything. The Mirror's article notes that the pain of circumcision is most likely to be even more severe in very young babies.
Read the whole article here.
