Costa Rica records 0.15% total-population male circumcision prevalence (Morris et al. 2016), among the lowest rates in the world. With no sizeable Jewish or Muslim community and no indigenous circumcision tradition, this research found no distinctive cultural or religious angle at all — circumcision in Costa Rica, where it happens, is overwhelmingly a therapeutic or elective medical procedure rather than a routine newborn or ritual practice.
Costa Rica records 0.15% total-population male circumcision prevalence (Morris et al. 2016, PMC4772313), among the lowest rates anywhere in the world. The figure held up under scrutiny across multiple independent verifications and was not among the six countries corrected in the paper's published erratum.
Unlike several of its Central American and Caribbean neighbours already profiled in this research programme — Panama's proportionally large Jewish community, Trinidad and Tobago's Indo-Trinidadian Muslim minority, Belize's patchwork of distinct ethnic groups — Costa Rica presented this research with no comparable distinctive cultural or religious angle to trace. The country has no sizeable Jewish or Muslim minority population, and this research could not verify any specific policy statement from the Caja Costarricense de Seguro Social (CCSS, Costa Rica's universal public healthcare system) regarding routine infant circumcision, nor any pediatric-association position — both honest, explicitly flagged gaps rather than assumed non-positions. What general regional medical-practice sources do indicate is that circumcision in Costa Rica, where it occurs at all, functions overwhelmingly as a therapeutic or elective medical procedure — addressing phimosis and similar indications — rather than as a routine newborn practice or a religious or cultural rite.
This research did not locate a Costa Rican statute addressing non-therapeutic male circumcision, nor any verified Costa Rica-specific circumcision harm case — both honest gaps. Costa Rica does not appear on ARC Law's compiled global list of countries known to regulate the practice. Female genital mutilation is a wholly separate matter, not addressed by this profile.
Costa Rica has an HIV adult prevalence of approximately 0.6% (2023, World Bank/UNAIDS modeled estimate). Costa Rica is not one of the 15 WHO Voluntary Medical Male Circumcision (VMMC) priority countries.
