I am not a fan of needles, and I can count the number of times I donated blood with a couple of fingers. Hence, it came as a surprise to me when I found out that in some countries gay men (who have sex) are not eligible to donate blood. It was a "wow" moment for me, and not in a good way. Why on earth would such a discriminatory exclusion be put in place?
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| image courtesy of abcnews.go.com |
As it turns out, "men who have sex with men" or MSMs have been prohibited from donating blood since around 1977 because of the mysterious virus that seemed to only affect gay guys: HIV. MSMs had to be excluded from the possible donors' list because there was limited information about the virus. There was no way to measure or diagnose the agent, and there were no tests available. It made sense that the group of people believed to be exclusively carrying the virus be prevented from spreading it around, in a manner of speaking.
The FDA has since classified gay men as "high risk donors," no matter how "safe" they were. Note that the ban was put in place before HIV testing was made available.
Now, certain medical and LGBT groups are questioning this ban. The American Red Cross, the American Medical Association and the American Association of Blood Banks even called the FDA ban "discriminatory and not based on sound science." Given that the HIV virus can now be easily tested, would it make sense to just lift the ban altogether?
According to reports, lifting the blood donation ban from homosexual men would dramatically increase the amount of blood available for transfusion, and could literally save millions of lives. Roughly 291,145 liters of additional blood can be collected annually if gay men were allowed to donate. Even if the rule was just slightly relaxed to allow donations from guys who haven't had a sexual partner for at least year, this would still yield an estimated 150,000 liters.
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| image courtesy of nyulocal.com |
So why is it no longer reasonable to keep the ban?
1. New Testing Methods
Diagnostic tests can now detect the nucleic acids corresponding to the HIV virus. It is now possible to identify an early infection within two weeks. If somebody gets a negative result over two weeks they are not likely to carry the virus at all.
2. Celibacy
If they are looking for gay donors who haven't had sex since 1977, then it sets an unreasonable expectation of celibacy. The numbers go higher if you include bisexuals, bi-curious, and straight guys who just "tried it out."
3. International Standards
Some countries have changed their standards in terms of accepting blood donations from MSMs. Canada, for instance, has lowered the "deferral period," or the period of time without man on man sex, to 5 years. Other countries no longer have such a deferral period (they are free to donate as long as they are clean).
4. Discriminatory
It is weird that men who have sex with other men are banned form donating forever, while men who have sex with women of "unknown status" or "HIV- positive status" are only banned for a year.
5. We Can Just Lie
What's to stop guys from lying about their sexual history anyway?
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| image courtesy of thecircular.org |
I mentioned earlier that I have previously donated blood. I don't think I have ever encountered such a restriction here in the Philippines. Back in college, it was mandatory to donate blood (unless you're not medically qualified), and I've seen gay and straight guys line up with no issue. It makes me wonder if there are no such restrictions here (I asked a couple of people and they don't seem to know about this restriction), or if it's just not enforced (after all, Wikipedia classified the Philippines as having "indefinite" deferral for MSM).
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