Vice President of IMANI Africa, Bright Simons, has reacted to the recent reports surrounding the purported shrinking of the male reproductive organ in Kasoa.
Per reports, seven individuals have fallen victim.
In a post on X platform, Mr Simons likened the current situation to an outbreak dubbed “koro”, a psychotic/panic anxiety disease that “triggered mass hysteria in many parts of the world, from China & Thailand to Nigeria & Kenya for decades.”
Per the information shared by Mr Simons, the koro phenomenon is also known among diverse ethnic and religious groups in Asia and Africa, typically in cultures in which reproductive ability is a major determinant of a young person’s worth.
“Koro epidemics of panic anxiety due to widespread fears of losing one’s genitals, procreative ability, and even one’s life, are triggered by rumors of genital disappearance supposedly caused in China by female fox spirits, in Singapore and Thailand by mass poisoning, and in Africa by sorcery, usually in the context of socioeconomic or political tension.
“Today, in contemporary Western societies, ideas of genital disappearance are not culturally endorsed. But historically, it should be remembered that in the late Middle Ages in Europe, a man could lose his membrum virile through magical attacks by witches.
“The conclusion is that the psychological disappearance of the penis is a universal syndrome that was described recently in Asia and Africa and already in Medieval Europe.”
The reported shrinking of genitals is not a new phenomenon in Ghana. In January 1997, 19 people were arrested for assaulting an innocent individual and disserminating false information on the shrinking of genitalia.
Currently, a District Court at Awutu Breku has remanded into police custody a 22-year-old electrician who allegedly raised false alarm that his penis shrunk at Millenium City in Kasoa.
Michael Nelson is being held over publication of false news and causing unlawful harm.
Nelson is said to have raised alarm falsely that his penis had shrunk and accused Safiru Bohari, a nail technician, the complainant, as the one who caused it.
Due to the accused person’s false alarm, Bohari was beaten up by some people.
The court did not take the plea of Michael Nelson. He is expected to reappear before the court presided over by Naomi Kontuor on April 11, 2024.