An Islamic circumciser who has removed thousands of foreskins at his Melbourne centre is fighting a prohibition order on the grounds that he carries out religious “rituals” and does not provide a health service.
Louay El Masri, who runs the Islamic Circumcision Centre in Dallas in the city’s north, was issued with a notice from the Health Complaints Commissioner (HCC) in April banning him from carrying out “medical circumcisions”, defined as those performed to treat a disease.
The order, which resulted from a 2021 complaint by a patient, also required Mr El Masri to display signs declaring that he is not a registered medical practitioner, cannot perform medical circumcisions, and does not hold indemnity insurance.
But the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal (VCAT) later ordered a stay on the notice, and Mr El Masri’s lawyer argued at the tribunal that the HCC, Victoria’s healthcare regulator, had no jurisdiction over his client’s work, Maribyrnong Leader reported.
The lawyer said he would argue that Mr El Masri was “providing ritual circumcisions that are not a health service”.
VCAT Senior Member Jonathon Smithers responded by saying “there may be an interesting legal question at the bottom of this” but that if Mr El Masri was successful the resulting loophole might then be closed by state parliament changing the law.
Mr El Masri claims cooperated fully with the HCC investigation and says he was “misled” and told “in bad faith” that the watchdog had the power to regulate his business, the tribunal was told. The case will return to VCAT at a later date.
The Islamic Circumcision Centre website states on its homepage that “Mr El Masri is NOT a medical practitioner and cannot perform any medical circumcisions”, and describes him as a “third generation ritual circumciser” with over 20 years of experience.
“We at Islamic Circumcision Centre offer a safe and traditional Islamic way of circumcision. Our procedure is performed on boys from birth to adulthood,” the website states.
“Brother Louay El Masri uses a virtually painless circumcision technique that applies a Mogen clamp with a long-acting local anaesthetic.”
Header image credit: Islamic Circumcision Centre.
