Health: to me the issue is who are “they” and what sort of solution are they going to find? I suspect that if the original mohel had agreed to stop metzitzah b’peh, or even to some control measure, we never would have gotten to this point. Since that original story, has there been any effort at all to systematize guidelines for mohelim regarding the risk of infection? Not to my knowledge, although I welcome anyone’s input.
So the government steps in and says that they will force us, not to stop bris, not to even stop metzitzah b’peh, but to let the parents know that there is a risk and ask that they formally accept it. It is, frankly, an almost perfectly conceived law, which is rare for government. It doesn’t affect the religious practice of people who want to do it – they are free to accept the risk. It doesn’t threaten certain mohelim. It doesn’t require any further oversight by the government. It does, in my estimation, two things. It gives opportunity for people who are less educated about or less committed to, metzitzah b’peh a set time to opt out. And it (likely) makes a mohel liable if it can be found that he was negligent in preparing, including in failing to inform. Both of those effects are perfectly reasonable – in fact, they would have been a great place for the community itself to start, if they were in fact interested in protecting babies’ health.