THE INCREDIBLE SHRINKING PENIS

As the world gets smaller, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of the American
Psychiatric Association, a delineator of all psychiatric maladies, must get
larger to accommodate culture-specific syndromes, according to psychiatrist
Albert Gaw. One such disorder that the Boston-based Gaw wants to see in the next
edition is called "koro." Victims believe that their genitals, particularly the
penis, are shrinking and that once retraction is complete, they will die.

Koro primarily strikes Chinese and Southeast Asians, according to Gaw. It tends
to occur in epidemics like the one that swept through Hainan Island, China, in
1984 and 1985, affecting some 2,000 men. Rumors had spread that spirits, who in
folk belief inhabit or possess individuals, were stealing penises from the
living. Gaw cites photos of men who used string or clamps--or even their
friends--to hold on to their supposedly retracting genitals.

Koro should be included in the American Psychiatric Association's Diagnostic and
Statistical Manual "so it can be compatible with the organization's
acknowledgment of cultural influences on certain psychiatric illnesses," Gaw
says. In addition, the syndrome is for the most part unrecognized in the United
States, even though Asian refugee, immigrant, and tourist populations are rising
"and we are seeing a few cases," he says.