From the BBC Africa November 18 2016:
18 November 2016 – Vasectomy operations on men in Kenya have been live streamed from a theatre in the capital as part a campaign to promote the sterilisation procedure.
At least 150 men booked in for the 20-minute procedure which involves severing the tubes that carry sperm.
Doctors performed the vasectomies on stage behind a curtain at the Kenyan National Theatre in Nairobi.
Kenyan men considering a vasectomy often fear the stigma of being seen as having lost their masculinity.
The World Vasectomy Day organisation was behind the event, which was broadcast on Facebook and included a panel of experts discussing “the myths and misconceptions about vasectomy”.
Campaigners reiterated that it was a safe form of family planning and why it was important in terms of “the country and the planet”.
“Many men have this perception that vasectomy causes a man to turn into a woman,” Dr Jack Chang, a Canadian doctor at the event, told the BBC.
“Some men fear that in Africa there’s a high mortality rate so they need to have more children.”
As the doctors operated behind a curtain, a panel of experts discussed family planning
The BBC’s Abdinoor Aden in Nairobi says some of the men who came to have a vasectomy were driven by economic concerns about having a large family.
Others said it was to help their partners.
“The family planning methods my wife was using have had bad effects on her so I opted to go and do vasectomy so that she can be relieved,” one man told the BBC.
What is a vasectomy?
The 20-minute procedure involves blocking the tube that transports sperm
- It involves surgically cutting or blocking the tubes that transport sperm from the testicles to the penis
- Afterwards there will be no noticeable difference in the volume of semen, but it will not contain sperm
- It can be reversed, but there is no guarantee it will succeed
- About 50 million men who have received a vasectomy worldwide.
Source: World Vasectomy Day
Link: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-38027215
