We must rethink a decades-old policy on blood donation blood
It is incredibly easy to find a location to donate blood. Here at the University of Idaho, blood drives are held in the Idaho Commons frequently, making donation a simple affair for anyone who wants to shed some blood for a noble cause. Unfortunately, some people are left out of this process and can’t donate at all.
Masen Matthews
The Food and Drug Administration has a policy that excludes any man who has ever had intercourse with another man from donating blood. On Thursday, the Obama administration began a series of hearings that may result in an easing of the ban on gay donors, and it’s time for that outdated policy to be removed.
According to the FDA, the policy went into effect in 1977 at the height of the HIV and AIDS crisis. On the required questionnaire in order to give blood, a question reads, “Have you had sexual contact with another male, even once?”
Answering yes means that the person can never donate blood again. A lifetime ban is not only exclusionary, but it is also completely unnecessary and provides no added safety to blood donation. Keep in mind, the FDA will let people donate blood even if they have previously had an STD, as long as they wait 12 months and obtain a clean bill of health before donating.
One central question to ask about this policy is why it exists in the first place. According to the FDA website, this policy is in place because “MSM [men who have had sex with other men] are, as a group, at increased risk for HIV, hepatitis B, and certain other infections that can be transmitted by transfusion.” The site goes on to assert the claim that this policy isn’t discriminatory because it “is not based on any judgment concerning the donor’s sexual orientation.”
The primary issue presented is that the FDA wrongly views sex with another man as some sort of riskier behavior than sex between a man and a woman. If a man has sex with one man, and another man has sex with 10 women, what makes the former so much riskier? Anyone can obtain an STD no matter what, and let’s not forget that there are plenty of straight people who have or have had HIV/AIDS as well. Eazy-E of the rap group NWA and Fela Kuti, a famous musician, are just a couple of straight people who have died from AIDS.
Regardless, there are ways to avoid contracting STDs and there are risk behaviors associated with an increased likelihood of contracting certain infections. None of these behaviors are solely associated with your sexual orientation, however.
The single biggest problem with this policy is that, even with a clean bill of health, someone who has had sex with another man can not donate blood under any circumstance. Modern medicine has granted the gifts of STD screenings. Despite this, the FDA’s policy seems completely bent on providing an assurance that blood from a man that has had male sexual partners is still somehow a threat to the overall blood supply. Testing can verify that this is not the case, and healthy blood can speak for itself regardless of who the possessor has slept with.
Banning men who have had same-sex intercourse from donating blood does nothing more than perpetuate an outdated stereotype, while mongering fear in the misused name of patient safety. It’s time for the FDA to let blood screenings and individual physicians make the final decision on blood safety and put an end to this outdated, offensive policy.
Masen Matthews can be reached at [email protected]