FGM rate drops in Egypt by 13% among teenage girls in six years

CAIRO: Newly released figures are showing that the prevalence of female genital mutilation (FGM) among teenage girls in Egypt between the ages of 15-17 has dropped from 74 percent to 61 percent from the years 2008-2014.
The country’s Health Ministry along with the National Population Council released the figures this week saying Egypt was able to cut the rate of the practice by 13 percent over a period of six years.
It said that new policies, laws and awareness campaigns have contributed to the decrease, a report by Al-Masry El-Youm has said.
According to the United Nations, the global number of women and girls who have undergone FGM has reached 200 million.
In 2014, according to the population health survey, FGM in Egypt stood at 92 percent among married girls between the ages of 15-49.
The World Health Organization (WHO) defines FGM as “any operation involving partial or total removal of female genitalia.”
Despite the fact that the practice has been criminalized in Egypt since 2008, an estimated 87 percent of the country’s girls and women aged between 15 to 49 have undergone FGM.
The practice is culturally believed among certain sectors of the Egyptian society that it “reduces” a woman’s sexual appetites.
But Egypt’s religious institutes such as Al-Azhar University and Dar El Iftaa’ have made efforts toward integrating anti-FGM in their programs.