The death of Mohamed Abdisamad
In February 2023, 6-month-old baby Mohamed Abdisamad tragically died from postoperative sepsis following a community circumcision procedure. Trained surgeons know that there are harms and side effects from all operations. To mitigate against such risks, licensed surgeons only operate when necessary and with informed consent, they use a sterile operating field, sterile instruments, and subject themselves to regular audit of their facilities and surgical outcomes. Failure to conform to these requirements will result in suspension or removal of their surgical licence to continue practising.
None of these safeguards were in place prior to Mohamed’s death. In a ‘Prevention of Future Deaths’ report sent to the Department of health and social care, the assistant coroner highlighted the ongoing risks of future child deaths. This is because, uniquely in surgical practice, non-therapeutic circumcision, the amputation of children’s healthy foreskins, when performed by lay practitioners, is considered exempt from regulatory oversight.
Consequently, it is not possible to know who is operating, how many children are being operated on, where the operations are taking place, or how many children suffer short or long-term side effects or complications. Action is sometimes taken only when something goes seriously wrong.
Failure to implement safeguards following child deaths
Mohamed’s death was not the first such tragic death. At least seven circumcision-related UK children’s deaths have been recorded over the past few years. A greater number of children have suffered harm.
In 2010, a midwife used a pair of scissors to amputate the healthy foreskin from Goodluck Caubergs. In 2012, Angelo Ofori-Mintah was mortally wounded by a rabbi also performing a community circumcision. Both babies died from extensive bleeding into their nappies within 48 hours of the procedure.
The unexpected death of a child in the UK is taken seriously. A multidisciplinary meeting, called PRUDIC (procedures related to unexpected death in childhood) explores the circumstances, offers support to grieving parents and seeks to identify avoidable factors that might mitigate against further child death or injury. Learning points are widely shared and inform updated guidance including child safeguarding policies.
Nigerian-born midwife Grace Adeleye was convicted of Goodluck’s manslaughter and was given a non-custodial sentence. Conversely, Rabbi Mordechai Cohen was reassured by the deputy coroner that he was “entirely blameless” for what she described as “…a tragic accident, an unforeseen consequence of the surgical procedure…” It is not apparent whether the lack of a regulatory framework for community circumcision was considered during the PRUDIC discussions that would have followed both babies’ deaths, but regulatory changes did not ensue.
There is mounting evidence of the intrinsic functional, erogenous and psychosexual value of a person’s foreskin itself and of the range and severity of known side effects from an irreversible circumcision procedure. Despite this, successive Governments and the medical professional bodies have consistently declined to recommend or introduce a regulatory or safeguarding framework for community circumcision operations, which would help to mitigate the inherent risks.
Recent convictions result in calls for urgent circumcision regulation
In this context, 2025 offered a rare opportunity for reflection and action. In unrelated trials, two men were given custodial sentences for causing serious harm to children related to community circumcision procedures. Commendably, both judges independently called for urgent regulation of the practice.
Both convicted men had inflicted serious harm and had additionally caused cruelty to children by means of lack of appropriate anaesthesia. Fortunately, despite the extent of their rogue practice, there were no documented child deaths attributable to the two men.
One of the two, Mohammed Alazawi, had pretended to unsuspecting parents that he was a trained doctor. He had also illegally administered prescription-only medicines to the children despite not being able to read English. The other man, Mohammad Siddiqui, had previously worked as an NHS paediatric surgeon until his licence to practice medicine was revoked in 2015 by the medical regulator, the GMC because he was found to have performed unsafe community childhood circumcision operations.
Incredibly, Mr. Siddiqui’s removal from the medical register served to allow him to continue performing community circumcisions as a lay person, and therefore without any oversight or regulation. The absurdity of this situation possibly contributed to the judge’s calls for urgent regulation. 
A former doctor has been jailed for five years and seven months after admitting he caused “painful cruelty to children” by running a mobile circumcision service.
Mohammad Siddiqui, 58, from Birmingham, was a practising doctor at the University Hospital Southampton NHS Foundation Trust when he started visiting homes to carry out circumcisions for money.
He was suspended and later struck off the General Medical Council (GMC) register but continued the circumcisions, which “ignored” basic hygiene rules.
Siddiqui pleaded guilty last October to 25 charges, including assault occasioning actual bodily harm and cruelty to a person under 16… [read more on the BBC website]
Government refusal to implement circumcision regulation
In February 2025, shortly after the judge’s remarks, the Government stated that: “The Ministry of Justice has no responsibility for non-therapeutic male circumcision or its regulation.” And in November 2025, in response to a parliamentary question about what action the Government might take, the Under-secretary of State for Patient Safety, Baroness Merron replied: “The Government has no plans to make changes to the regulatory framework for unanaesthetised non-therapeutic circumcision of boys…”
The urgency of regulation has only increased now that the Government has publicly confirmed it will not introduce new safeguards for unanaesthetised non-therapeutic circumcision, even as another child has lost their life under the same unregulated conditions. This recent Government statement approving the status quo, despite clear evidence of harm and calls for reform, shows that the issue is immediate and necessary.
The failure to act following repeated episodes of serious harm to children and judicial warnings, combined with an official position that no regulatory change is planned, highlights a systemic gap in the protection of children. This is out of step with broader child safeguarding norms in the UK and represents an ongoing unacceptable risk to children.
Mohamed Abdisamad sadly joins the growing list of babies and children maimed or killed by an unregulated medically unnecessary operation performed on their most intimate body parts.
Children’s rights, consent, and bodily integrity
Regulation should be the basic requirement. For any medical procedure, it is always preferable to use the most effective and least invasive option unless an informed, capacitous patient chooses otherwise.
Therefore, in the absence of a medical problem requiring treatment or prevention, circumcision should only ever be undertaken on consenting adults. Thus, the rightful place of non-therapeutic childhood circumcision in the medical arena should be as a serious child safeguarding concern.
As I have previously written, in the UK the reason for the continuation of non-therapeutic circumcision of boys is largely due to its ubiquity within the mainstream Muslim and Jewish communities. In this context, it is noteworthy that Baroness Merron served as chief executive of the Board of Deputies of British Jews between 2014 and 2021
Circumcision: A preventable harm that continues by design
Like Angelo and Goodluck before him, Mohamed’s death was not a tragic unforeseen accident. Their deaths were wrought by a wholly avoidable harmful, traditional wounding practice. Regulation is the minimum first step along the road to ending the widespread violation of children’s fundamental right to bodily integrity, regardless of who performs the procedure or of their parentage.
Author's note
Dr Antony Lempert is a GP and trustee of 15Square. He was born into a religious community that practises non-therapeutic circumcision of male children. He heads the health special expertise network and is a council member of the (UK) National Secular Society.
This blog represents the opinion of the author who takes sole responsibility for its content.
– This article was corrected on Jan 5th 2026, to correct a factual error.
Citations
Office for National Statistics (2026). Number of deaths due to male circumcision from 2005. Available at: https://www.ons.gov.uk/aboutus/transparencyandgovernance/freedomofinformationfoi/numberofdeathsduetomalecircumcisionfrom2005 (Accessed 5 January 2026).
The Guardian (2026). Coroner calls for circumcision safety measures after baby death in London. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/society/2026/jan/02/coroner-calls-circumcision-safety-measures-baby-death-london (Accessed 5 January 2026).
BBC News (2024). Baby dies after circumcision infection. Available at: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cqj2r8x2k4yo (Accessed 5 January 2026).
BBC News (2013). Rabbi not charged over baby’s circumcision death. Available at: https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-manchester-21374643 (Accessed 5 January 2026).
Kilburn Times (2012). Queen’s Park baby bled to death two days after being circumcised. Available at: https://www.kilburntimes.co.uk/news/22036666.queens-park-baby-bled-death-two-days-circumcised/ (Accessed 5 January 2026).
Journal of Clinical Medicine (2025). Complications and long term outcomes after male circumcision. Journal of Clinical Medicine, 14(13), Article 4730. Available at: https://www.mdpi.com/2077-0383/14/13/4730 (Accessed 5 January 2026).
National Secular Society (2025). Judge and parents call for boys to be protected from circumcision. Available at: https://www.secularism.org.uk/news/2025/01/judge-and-parents-call-for-boys-to-be-protected-from-circumcision (Accessed 5 January 2026).
Crown Prosecution Service (2025). Fake medical practitioner jailed after causing harm during multiple male circumcision operations. Available at: https://www.cps.gov.uk/cps/news/fake-medical-practitioner-jailed-causing-harm-during-multiple-male-circumcision-operations (Accessed 5 January 2026).
The Guardian (2012). Male circumcision, baby Goodluck and the limits of consent. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/dec/17/male-circumcision-baby-goodluck (Accessed 5 January 2026).
Crown Prosecution Service (2025). Former surgeon jailed five and a half years after admitting offences including assault. Available at: https://www.cps.gov.uk/cps/news/former-surgeon-jailed-five-and-half-years-after-admitting-offences-including-assault (Accessed 5 January 2026).
UK Parliament (2025). Written question HL4819. Safeguards and protections for ritual circumcision. Available at: https://questions-statements.parliament.uk/written-questions/detail/2025-02-06/hl4819 (Accessed 5 January 2026).
UK Parliament (2025). Written question HL11513. Regulation of non therapeutic circumcision of boys. Available at: https://questions-statements.parliament.uk/written-questions/detail/2025-10-31/HL11513/ (Accessed 5 January 2026).
Lempert A. Roadblocks to reforming UK guidelines on medically unnecessary penile circumcision: inconsistent safeguarding of bodily integrity. Clinical Ethics. 2023;19(4):349-361. doi:10.1177/14777509231216027 Available at: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/14777509231216027 (Accessed 5 January 2026).
National Secular Society (2025). Government greenlights no anaesthesia circumcision of boys. Available at: https://www.secularism.org.uk/news/2025/12/government-greenlights-no-anaesthesia-circumcision-of-boys (Accessed 5 January 2026).
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