Increasing numbers of women are having taxpayer-funded ‘virginity repair’ operations before marriage in the United Kingdom.
There were 116 hymen replacement operations carried out on the NHS between 2005 and 2009. The total for 2009 was 30, up 25 per cent from 24 in 2005.
The health service figures, which do not include data on the religion or marital status of the individuals, seem to echo a trend reported by private clinics, which are seeing a huge surge in demand for the procedure from Muslim women paying up to £4,000.
One Harley Street clinic said that demand for its half-hour procedure had tripled in recent months.
Doctors say patients are under pressure from future husbands or relatives who insist that they should be virgins on their wedding night.
Critics, including moderate Muslim groups, have condemned the trend as a sign of the spread of Islamic fundamentalism in the West.
During the hymenoplasty procedure – viewed by some as invasive and degrading – the hymen is stitched or reconstructed so that it will tear again and bleed on the woman’s wedding night.
In some cases, the vaginal lining can be used to create a false hymen. A blood capsule can then be inserted into the lining to ensure realistic blood flow when the membrane is broken.
Consultant gynaecologist Dr Magdy Hend performs hymenoplasty under local anaesthetic at his Regency Clinic on Harley Street. He charges £1,850 for the half-hour procedure and says that most of his clients are Muslim women.
He said: ‘In the past, we would do one or two hymen reconstruction operations a week. Sometimes now, we get two or three women a day. Demand has tripled.
‘Our Muslim clients worry about having had sex, and their fiance and family knowing that they have been touched before.
‘It is more cultural rather than religious. If the bride is not a virgin and does not bleed on the wedding night, it is a big shame on the family. There have been honour killings in extreme cases.
‘It is simple surgery that takes only half an hour. They can have it done at lunchtime and do not have to give their real names and addresses.’
Imam Dr Taj Hargey, chairman of the Muslim Educational Centre in Oxford, called on the Muslim community to try to reverse the trend.
He said: ‘The situation is very common in the Middle East where there is a huge scandal that can lead to divorce or even honour killings if there are not bloodstained bed sheets after the wedding night.
‘It is very disappointing that Muslim women in this country feel they need to lead a double life, resorting to subterfuge surgery.
‘That is not conducive to either their psychological or spiritual health, and it is hypocrisy and double standards because Muslim men are doing as they please with women.’
There have been calls for a ban on NHS surgeons carrying out the operations for women wanting to marry as virgins.
But a Department of Health spokesman insisted that hymen repair operations take place on the NHS only to ensure a patient’s physical or psychological health.
She said: ‘The NHS does not fund hymen repair operations for cultural reasons. All operations on the NHS are on the basis of clinical need.
‘Operations to repair the hymen are only carried out exceptionally to secure physical or psychological health.’
Credit: Mailonline
Brit Muslim woman of Pak origin recalls attempted honour killing
London: Honor killings and punishments have been well documented among a wide variety of ethnic and religious groups throughout the world, and especially in the United Kingdom.
Every year in the UK, a dozen women are victims of honor killings, occurring almost exclusively to date within Asian and Middle Eastern families. Often, cases are unresolved due to the unwillingness of family, relatives and communities to testify.
Take the case of Brit Muslim teen Saira. The eldest of four children, she had a blissfully happy upbringing, growing up in a sprawling ten-bedroom house and going to a 20,000-pound-a-year private school.
Her Muslim parents were educated and respected members of the community. Her mother was general practitioner and her dad was a successful businessman.
She was encouraged to follow her dream of becoming a barrister, worked hard and was popular at school in the south of England.
But when she turned 14, Saira’s idyllic life changed forever.
Her mother saw her with a friend who was smoking, and that started a catastrophic sequence of events, which saw her being beaten by her mother and father and pulled out of school; packed off to Pakistan for an arranged marriage at the age of 17, being sexually abused and degraded by her husband and falling pregnant.
Forced to flee back to England, she was stabbed in an attempted "honour killing".
The attack led to her losing the baby.
Now 19, Saira says, "I had a happy childhood then my mum saw one of my friends smoking. Everything was different. The atmosphere at home changed but, at that time, I didn't know why.
Saira desperately turned to social services thrice, and when her parents found out, she was battered.
Saira said, "I thought they weren't going to stop until I was dead."
Saira says, "One day I got home and my bags were packed. My parents said I needed a holiday and that I was booked on a flight to Pakistan in two hours. It was so weird - they'd hired a guy to stand guard so even when I went to the toilet he was waiting outside. It was horrific."
Her aunt collected her from the airport in Pakistan and demanded she hand over her passport. Saira was kept as a prisoner with two servants watching her every move.
Saira says, "I opened my bags and the penny dropped. I nearly fainted - it was all wedding clothes."
She spent a month under lock and key until her "big day". Her parents were there for the ceremony and she recalls sitting next to her mother.
Saira said, "I begged her, 'Don't make me do this', but she just sat there. I couldn't run away, I didn't have my passport."
By now she was 17 - and married to a man of 25 she didn't know.
Saira says, "I was terrified. I was begging my mum, 'Don't leave me', but she treated me like I was dirt on her shoe." Saira endured three months of sexual abuse at the hands of her "husband".
She says, "I was his target for any depravity going. I was like his sex toy. I also had to support us both, working 9 am until 9 pm."
To make matters worse, she then found out she was pregnant.
Saira realised she would have to be clever to escape her terrible existence. She says, "I called my mum and said I accepted my marriage but wanted to complete my education in the UK so I could sponsor my husband to come over.
"That worked and I returned to England alone. On my third night back my mother looked at me and said I seemed different.
"I broke the news that I was pregnant... and then it all came out - the abuse, how I was working such long hours.
My mum said, 'He is your husband, even if he kills you we don't care'."
Despite social services letting her down in the past, she called again. This time they sorted her a place in a hostel and she began her studies at sixth form college.
She combined that with voluntary work with youths hooked on drugs and alcohol.
Things were going as well and one winter evening, when she was six months pregnant, Saira headed to the local shop to satisfy a craving.
She says, "I saw a man in a hoodie. I'd seen him a few times but thought it was just a coincidence - until he grabbed me.
"He said I had to go home to my parents or he would kill me. I said 'Go ahead' and he repeated his threat. The next thing I knew I was in hospital. I'd been stabbed in the stomach."
Medics operated on her and she was induced. The baby was born but didn't survive.
The doctors called her mother to tell her what had happened. She said she had no daughter - that she died a long time ago.
Despite her belief that her parents were behind the attack, Saira didn't have enough evidence to nail them.
She says, "I didn't have proof except he had said 'return home to your parents' so I couldn't prosecute. They got away with it.
Now aged 19, she is awaiting her A-level results and is ready to take a place at university to study law and continue her dream to be a barrister.
She also has a new man in her life - a Muslim who treats her with kindness and respect.
Saira says, "His family is fantastic. I do sometimes have flashbacks but I count his family as my own now."
