Posted on 12/28/2014 12:32:46 PM PST by SeekAndFind
The Food and Drug Administration has announced that it's easing restrictions on gay men donating blood, reversing a policy enacted during the outbreak of the AIDS epidemic decades earlier.
In a statement released Tuesday, the FDA said easing the ban came after several years of research into the matter.
"Following this review, and taking into account the recommendations of advisory committees to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the FDA, the agency will take the necessary steps to recommend a change to the blood donor deferral period for men who have sex with men from indefinite deferral to one year since the last sexual contact," stated the FDA.
"The FDA intends to issue a draft guidance recommending this proposed change in policy in 2015, which will also include an opportunity for public comment."
In 1983, the FDA established a lifetime ban on blood donations from men who had had sexual intercourse with other men.
The ban came in response to the HIV-AIDS epidemic, as many were contracting the disease via blood transfusions from blood donated by HIV-positive individuals.
A notable example was professional African-American tennis player Arthur Ashe, who contracted the AIDS virus via a blood transfusion.
"At the time, little was known about the human immunodeficiency virus, which causes the disease, and there was no quick test to determine whether somebody had it," reported The New York Times.
"Restrictions on donors were written when HIV testing was slower and less refined. Today, some tests can detect the virus in blood as little as nine days after infection."
(Excerpt) Read more at christianpost.com ...
Liberalism will get us all killed.
I remember seeing that show.I am still laughing at that dumbass.
In fact, nothing at all happened in Germany or the rest of Europe. But `mad cow’ disease in the British Isles (Jakob-Creutzfeldt) was extrapolated to include Europe; anyone who lived or served there 1980-1996 was banned from donating.
I gave blood after 9-11. The ban didn’t go into effect until 2002!
I almost completely agree with you . The point to having any rule about anything is that there typically is some rationale for the restriction that has to do with an expected and desired outcome. In the case of blood, it has to do with public safety and the fact that those who engage in sexual activity with others of the same sex have a very high chance of harbouring diseases that will infect the blood supply. Here is the way I look at this Its one thing to have a rule and know that there will be people who will break that rule. Its another thing to take the position that they are just going to break the rule anyway so why have the rule. Keeping the rule at least lets those who violate the rule know that they are doing something wrong. Changing the rule (about prohibiting blood from those who engage in same sex sexual activities) absolutely normalizes the activity that was the reason there was a rule in the first place and in the future when there is an infected blood supply, the finger wont be pointed at them . they are just behaving normally and after all, AIDS is not totally a disease restricted to those who engage in same sex sexual activity, right?
For the record, AIDS is the disease that often comes to mind when one considers to those who engage in same sex sexual activity but that is just the disease that has gotten the most attention. There are a host of others as well .. anal cancer, syphilis, parasites (bacterial/viral/protozoan), amoebiasis, gonorrhea, anorectal sepsis, Tptein-Barr Type 2 virus, hepatitis A/B/C virus, prostate/testicular/colon cancer, colitis, enteritis, proctitis, proctocolitis, pubic lice, human papilloma virus .and on and on. What I like to tell people is this Sexual activity that is conducted exclusively between faithful husbands and wives promotes good health in every possible way. In fact, the more sex they have, the healthier they are (and this not restricted to the physical). The exact opposite is the case with same sex sexual activity every bit of sexual activity they conduct is harmful EVEN IF IT INVOLVES A MONOGAMOUS RELATIONSHIP (like that ever happens amongst same sex participants).
No doubt the concept of opening up blood donations to participants involved in same sex sexual relations (even if there has been celibacy for a year) is ludicrous .. just with AIDS alone, thousands of innocent hemophiliacs died because HIV positive individuals infected the blood supply. The idea of opening up that risk again even with new means of screening blood is beyond stupid.
The moot point that Id like to raise where I dont totally agree with you has to do with your use of the word gay. This has become defined as one who is naturally attracted sexually to those of their own sex. Since it is preposterous and misguided to consider the idea that people are born that way and thus need to have a specific word to identify them as a class of individuals, I suggest that such language that talks to this issue on what are ultimately their terms be rejected. To use that word is to give credence to their existence in the manner that they portray their existence. There is no such thing as being gay
.God did not create any people to think or behave in this way. There is only those whose lives have gone completely off course from His intended plan and they are engaging in same sex (or homosexual) activity. They are not gay as a special class of individuals
. We were created to be sexual individuals but for whatever reason (and sometimes through no fault or motivation of their own), their sexuality has been allowed to manifest itself in a perverted manner. Gay people dont exist
. only perverted people exist.
Please don’t say that. My son received 17 units of blood and even more plasma. He lived. He was shot in the chest. I give regularly.
Abstinent gay..... right.
Back in first grade when I was learning to read, "gay" was one of my favorite words. It wasn't until I was in high school that I learned the other meaning and it ruined it for me.
all the gay men will be lying. that simple.
I wont even give them that. I would call them sodomites but that always comes across as a bit confrontation
. So I just call them those who engage in perverted homosexual acts. I like to think that I do my best to be factual
..
Yes it is, and they do. Complete perversion void of morals and character.
For one year? They can’t for one hour.
Hell would freeze over before they were for one year!
Why put the entire blood supply at risk for 2 or 3% of the population?
I haven’t eaten any European beef in over 34 years, but still can’t donate due to the chance of mad cow...I’d hazard that my blood is statistically safer than that of a homosexual who claims to have been abstinent for a year...
We are already depopulating as it is, strictly on te lifestyle of the modern world, and the fact that people don’t start families or get decent paying jobs until later in life. This is totally to appease the whining of a special group of people and to spite religion. Period. I myself have not until recently been much more than agnostic or deist. But to see the hate campaign being pushed, as well as all the commonalities between that and the other tyrannical propaganda put out for causes such as anti semitism, or the film birth of a nation, the targeting campaign for religion stank to me. We’re no longer in the days where the “apparent” power is held by religion, but by the Godless. Everything in this agenda is about targeting and building support to destroy Christianity. Best we can do now is find people to show them the error of their ways, because those who blindly spite God are heading down a self-destructive path. As Isaiah put it, “drunken with their own blood.” Build up the strength, shine a light, and hold on to the rock, because it is about the get heavy with WW3 and the plagues.
The nature of their behavior, combined with the number of people they do it with, is highly contagious for HIV. But they don’t want to admit that reality, they want to say that the CDC stats are lies meant to hurt homos.
That is just not true. Some of them prefer to be the bung hole. Or pie hole. Etc.
Unfortunately, the health of the nation is being held hostage to Political correctness.
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