Good morning all! hope everyone had a great weekend, summer is almost officially here and I'm loving it cant wait to hit the beach again.. California girls by Katy perry just came on and is not putting me in the mood of wanting to be outside. inside of cooped up in this place, anyways i had no idea they had banned gay males from donating! this was all new to me. enjoy the article.
Ignoring arguments that a ban on gay male blood donors is based on fear and discrimination rather than science, a key federal committee on Friday failed to overturn the controversial policy first implemented during the height of the AIDS crisis.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services decided to continue the 25-year-old blood donation ban on men who have had sex with other men since 1977. The members of the committee concluded that there was not enough scientific evidence to warrant a change to the policy.
The ban was implemented during the HIV/AIDS crisis of the 1980s as a way of containing the risk of spreading the disease. However, many gay-rights activists, scientists and federal and local government officials have called the ban unfair and unnecessary.
"I am completely disheartened that our federal government failed to lift this archaic ban," said Santa Clara County Supervisor Ken Yeager. "The American Red Cross and other respected organizations have long advocated that this policy is medically unnecessary. Today's decision is rooted in ignorance, not science."
In recent months, a group of senators led by Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., have called upon the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to lift the ban. In his testimony to the blood advisory committee, Kerry called the policy discriminatory.
"This lingering policy is responsible for turning away thousands of healthy donors from blood clinics across the country,
not because they have engaged in highly risky behavior, but because they are gay," Kerry said. "This is blood that could save lives."
The Blood Centers of the Pacific, the blood bank that serves the Bay Area, recommended that the blood advisory committee lift the lifetime ban and allow a man to donate blood 12 months after his last sexual contact with another man. According to blood bank policies, an individual who is considered "high risk," such as those who have traveled to a foreign country or received a tattoo, must wait at least 12 months before donating blood. The Blood Centers noted that applying the same policies for high-risk individuals to men who have sex with men would have been sufficient.
"The science has shown that a 12-month wait period should be sufficient and so anything like what we currently have, to us that appears discriminatory. You don't need that," said Lisa Bloch, director of communications for Blood Centers of the Pacific.
The FDA reports that the prevalence of HIV among those designated as "men who have sex with men" is 60 times higher than that of the general population. Rates of hepatitis and other STDs also are higher among that group, according to the FDA.
Despite the elevated risks in that group and the conclusion reached by the blood advisory committee, blood banks ensure that their donations go through rigorous testing. Each donation collected by the Blood Centers of the Pacific undergoes 13 tests, seven of which test for HIV/AIDS, hepatitis, syphilis and other STDs. For the HIV/AIDS test, technology used by the blood bank can detect HIV up to seven days after the individual has been infected. Data also shows that the error rate for these tests is low.
"We and other blood centers are at the forefront of research in terms of transmitted infectious agents including among demographics such as men who have sex with men," said Dr. Kim Anh Nguyen, the medical director at the Blood Centers of the Pacific. "So far we have not found other emerging viruses like HIV."
Because of the ban, the Blood Centers of the Pacific estimates a loss of more than 1,000 pints of potential blood donations each year. Companies and universities, including San Jose State, will not allow organizations to solicit blood donations on their property because of their "discriminatory" practices. Moreover, blood centers from around the United States experience year-round shortages of blood, leaving the Bay Area to import 20 percent of its blood from outside the state.
"I'm disappointed because I'm afraid that student groups and other groups are going to blame the blood banks," said Nguyen. "Blood centers hope that groups that are disappointed and angered by this don't take it out on patients and continue to support blood donations."
The Bay Area's lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community also has been a longtime advocate of lifting the ban, and many say the policy will continue to ostracize gay men.
"On the face of it, it just seems to be discriminatory. It's obviously targeted toward gay men," said Chris Flood, the board of directors at San Jose's Billy De Frank LGBT Community Center. "If the concern really is about people who are promiscuous giving blood, then there should be a question about people sleeping with multiple sex partners, not just gay men."
original article.
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