Activists working to end female genital mutilation in Africa find themselves in a bitter phase of the struggle. Now that some traditional practitioners have disavowed it, many doctors and nurses are taking up the illegal practice. And these are people that activists thought were their friends. "With activists campaigning about the unhygienic conditions in which traditional circumcisers carry out their trade, some parents are taking their daughter to the modern doctors," says Efua Dorkenoo, a Ghanaian activist against FGM. "This is actually taking people centuries back," says Millie Odhiambo, executive director of The CRADLE (also known as the Child Rights Advisory Documentation and Legal Centre).