Female Genital Mutilation: A Preventable Public Health Crisis

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JULY 22, 2026 By Alissah Simeon

“It’s important that all health workers know that there is no medical justification for female genital mutilation,” said Ian Askew, former Director of the World Health Organization’s Department of Reproductive Health and Research, in a 2016 WHO interview. Women and girls around the world are being oppressed. They are held back from exploring their identities and instead forced to live in ways they do not desire, and it often starts when they are young. In parts of Africa, the Middle East, and Asia, it is common for underage girls to go through Female Genital Cutting (FGC), also known as Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), and it is most prevalent in Africa. Defined by the World Health Organization (WHO), it is all procedures involving partial or total removal of the external female genitalia or other injury to the female genital organs for cultural and non-medical reasons. Not only is this unjust and cruel, but it cannot be sugar-coated. FGM is classified into four major types, each with sub-divisions. The most extreme of the types is Type III or infibulation, the process of narrowing the vaginal opening with the creation of a covering seal which cuts and repositions the labia minora or labia majora. Although this process is reversible by deinfibulation, the emotional and physical pain that it can cause the victim is treacherous and inhumane. The deaths from FGM could also be prevented, but due to the problems of social traditions, pressure from communities, beliefs about marriageability, and gender inequality, it becomes harder for the ones doing it to acknowledge that it is wrong. The voice that these women and girls need starts with the change initiated by others when they begin to speak up about this issue.