Posted on 09/27/2014 8:34:55 PM PDT by Phillyred
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Lifting a ban on blood donations from gay men would increase the amount of available blood by hundreds of thousands of pints (liters) each year and save more than a million lives a year, a California study showed.
The U.S. Federal Drug Administration has banned gay men from donating blood since 1983, when it was discovered that HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, was being transmitted through transfusions.
Eliminating the ban could bring in roughly 615,300 pints (291,145 liters) of blood annually, while allowing donations from gay men who had not had a sexual partner in a year could yield 317,000 pints (150,000 liters), the study estimated.
With a five-year policy, nearly 300,000 pints (142,000 liters) could be collected, according to the study by the Williams Institute on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Law at the University of California, Los Angeles.
"The American Red Cross suggests that each blood donation has the potential to be used in life-saving procedures on three individuals," said study co-author Ayako Miyashita. "Our estimates suggest that lifting the blood donation ban ... could be used to help save the lives of more than 1.8 million people."
The American Medical Association, the American Red Cross and AABB, formerly the American Association of Blood Banks, said in a statement this summer that the lifetime ban on blood donations for men who have had sex with other men should be modified.
HIV has targeted a disproportionate number of gay men since the 1970s, with 72 percent of new HIV infections in 2010 affecting gay and bisexual male youth.
(Excerpt) Read more at philly.com ...
A guy on my dorm floor in college was infected the same way. He’s still alive, AFAIK, but it messed up his life big time.
Cool I posted even before I read yours, but you said it better.
I seriously doubt that accepting blood donations from that 1% of the population that is gay male is going to make a big difference in blood supply.
I wonder how many people are indefinitely deferred from donating because they have a history of living in certain areas in Europe during the mad cow era?
Neither me, my husband, or our son can ever donate blood for that reason.
The study is biased and pro gay from the Williams Institute. The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) reports that men having sex with men (MSM), still have a high level of HIV, and growing rapidly. From the CDC website: “Gay and bisexual men — referred to in CDC surveillance systems as men who have sex with men (MSM)1 — of all races continue to be the risk group most severely affected by HIV. CDC’s most recent data show that between 2008 and 2010, the number of new infections among MSM increased 12 percent, with an even steeper increase among the youngest MSM.”
“I had 2 good friends growing up who were hemophiliacs and were killed by AIDS infested blood.”
I am merely speculating in your friends’ cases, but isn’t it convenient to just blame “tainted blood” when one contracts AIDS?
Not if they were hemophiliacs.
Um, hello. Anyone in Europe in the late 1980s is banned from giving blood, forever, in the USA. including our service people and including me. The reason given is that there was an outbreak of mad cow in England during those years. Most of us were not even in England and had no access to UK beef. Yet we are banned from ever giving blood.
First open the stupid rules against us before you open them to gay men.
How do they know that they are gay?
I cannot donate my O+ blood because of malaria & hepatitis. Would you rather chance getting one of those or HIV?
When we lived in Africa, I can assure you that if one of my family had needed blood, they would have been given mine rather than some unknown from the blood bank.
This story is totally illogical. It is unreasonable to think that an increase in blood donations of two to three percent would result in saving a million lives in a single year - that would otherwise be lost!
Nonsense.
fta... The American Medical Association, the American Red Cross and AABB, formerly the American Association of Blood Banks, said in a statement this summer that the lifetime ban on blood donations for men who have had sex with other men should be modified.
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Obviously a tactic aimed at reducing the number of long term care patients and the associated costs.
So millions of folks are dying because of a blood shortage, and without the sodomy factor, that doesn’t make the news?
BS- bad serum. Good grief, can we head down the drain, a bit faster, please?
I am merely speculating in your friends’ cases, but isn’t it convenient to just blame “tainted blood” when one contracts AIDS?
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In the late ‘80s-early ‘90s, there was an experienced female nurse (I think in her 30s) in Fort Worth who accidently stuck herself with a needle that had just been used on an AIDS patient.
Her immune system began shutting down soon after and, knowing she was to die, she went on many radio and TV programs to talk about the dangers of HIV and AIDS. She died in less than a year.
That accident with a only a syringe needle should serve as a major alarm against blood transfusions from people afflicted with HIV or AIDS.
I’m enough of a math person to have trouble seeing how 615,300 pints a year of infected blood could save a million people a year, even if the diseases they carry were in ant way good for you.
Socialize the evil; kill everybody equally. This crap is straight from the Prince of Lies. Pure, unadulterated evil.
This is a terrible idea for the reasons cited. ,,, If you want to increase donations the way to do so is very simple ... stop classifying whole blood donations as a “organ” donation ... this is done for the blood banks benefit to criminalize payment for the donation ,, same as it is criminal in the US to pay for a kidney... If you could offer someone a realistic payment of perhaps $100 for a unit you would be inundated with healthy donors.
“How is blood from less than 3% of the population going to really save over a million lives?”
Common Core math I suspect.
I think this is just a gay agenda thing and only a negligent attempt to kill people (as opposed to an intentional attempt to kill). Those of us stationed in Europe during the cold war are still banned due to Mad Cow disease.
NO - NO - NO - Always and forever NO!!!!
These anus-humping bass-turds and their well-deserved AIDS infection killed a childhood friend whose only wrong was having Hemophilia requiring clotting factors. This must NEVER HAPPEN to somebody else.
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