Operation Hope

Rakai Health Sciences Program

Twenty-five million dead, and still the AIDS epidemic rages on. In the absence of a cure, nations have deployed educational programs, condoms, antiretroviral drugs… and now, surgery. The Bloomberg School’s Maria Wawer and Ron Gray, and colleagues in the Rakai Health Sciences Program in Uganda showed that male circumcision could reduce a man’s risk of acquiring HIV by more than half.

Though obstacles exist, large-scale circumcision programs could have a major impact on the epidemic in sub-Saharan Africa. Rakai Program surgeons have already circumcised nearly 10,000 men. “This is completely unique in public health. We’ve never before used surgery to prevent an infectious disease,” says Gray.