The governor of Voralberg province in Austria has instructed hospitals to halt non-medical circumcisions until the “legal situation is clarified” in his country.
Two hospitals in Switzerland last week also cited the German ruling when then announced that they would temporarily stop performing circumcisions.
For his part, Wallner says he sees the German court’s decision, which rose from a case where the religious circumcision of a child led to medical complications, as “precedence-setting judgment.”
Critics of Wallner’s decision say that even if the Bundesverfassungsgericht were to uphold the ban on non-medical circumcisions, Austria’s own courts could well issue a divergent ruling.
According to local health officials, only one of two circumcisions are performed for religious in Viralberg’s hospitals each month.