220 Moro boys circumcised free by multi-sector group

COTABATO CITY, Philippines — More than 200 Moro boys belonging to marginalized families in Pagalungan town in Maguindanao del Sur were circumcised for free during a two-day outreach mission of volunteer Muslim and Christian health workers.

Radio reports here on Saturday quoted local officials, among them Pagalungan Mayor Salik Mamasabulod, as saying that a team from the office in the Bangsamoro parliament of regional lawmaker Kadil Monera Sinolinding Jr., volunteers from the Deseret Foundation in Cotabato province and private individuals involved in humanitarian projects in Moro communities together facilitated the August 15 to 16 outreach activity in their municipality.

Up to 220 Moro boys from different barangays in Pagalungan, among them children of members of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, mostly farmers, were circumcised by volunteer medical practitioners during the two-day community service activity.

The medical mission was supported by Bangsamoro Chief Minister Ahod Balawag Ebrahim, employees of the private Deseret Hospital in Kabacan town in Cotabato and cause-oriented groups helping push forward the health service thrusts of the Ministry of Health Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao.

Besides being a member of the 80-seat Bangsamoro parliament, Sinolinding, a physician-ophthalmologist, is also a concurrent minister of the Ministry of Health-BARMM.

Mamasabulod said apart from the free circumcision of more than 200 children in Pagalungan, the team involved in the outreach mission that started early Thursday and culminated on Friday also examined local residents with eye problems, cataract and pterygium, some of them already listed for surgery at the private Deseret Hospital in nearby Kabacan town.