Posted on 11/28/2014 12:59:23 PM PST by Tolerance Sucks Rocks
Advisers for the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) will meet next week to decide whether gay men should be allowed to donate blood, the agency’s biggest step yet toward changing the 30-year-old prohibition.
If the FDA accepts the recommendation from its advisory board, it would roll back a policy that has faced mounting criticism from LGBT advocates and some members of Congress for more than four years.
“We’ve got the ball rolling. I feel like this is a tide-turning vote,” said Ryan James Yezak, an LGBT activist who founded the National Gay Blood Drive and will speak at next week’s meeting. “There’s been a lot of feet dragging and I think they’re realizing it now.”
Reconsidering the policy will be the first agenda item for the Advisory Blood Products Advisory Committee when it meets Dec. 2
Critics of the ban, which was enacted during the national AIDS epidemic in 1983 and was last updated in 1992, say it ignores mounds of scientific evidence concluding that blood donations pose no risk than the greater public if properly screened.
Groups such as the American Red Cross and America’s Blood Centers voiced support for the policy change this month, calling the ban “medically and scientifically unwarranted.” The American Medical Association voted to end the ban last summer.
“The public health rationale for this ban has kind of been packed away,” said Glenn Cohen, a medical ethics professor at Harvard Law School who criticized the ban in an article recently published in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Members of Congress have also thrown in their support, led by those in the Congressional LGBT Equality Caucus.
Gay rights groups are also increasingly targeting the policy, bolstered by recent victories like the military eliminating its “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” policy and the Supreme Court striking down major portions of the Defense of Marriage Act.
Fighting the ban on blood donations is a logical next step for their advocacy, Cohen said.
“It’s a little crazy that you can shed blood for your country, but you can’t donate blood to another human being,” he added.
Some advocates say that people are surprised to hear the policy still exists despite the decades of advances in research.
Richard Dedor, an author and speaker who is gay, remembers trying to donate bone marrow about 18 months ago to help a family friend.
As he was filling out the form, he was shocked when he read a question asking if he had had sex with men.
“I sat there for a second and thought, should I be honest, or should I lie?” he recalled.
He said he decided to answer the question honestly, and realized then that he would get involved in the fight to strike down the ban.
“Others in my exact same situation do lie because they believe so vehemently that they have the right — forget the right, the ability — to keep the blood supply and the bone marrow supply safe,” he said. “We have the ability to help save lives.”
The FDA says that it still asks about men who have sex with men because no other questions are able to identify people with same risks to sexually transmitted infections, like HIV.
“In the future, improved questionnaires may be helpful to better select safe donors, but this cannot be assumed without evidence,” according to the agency’s website.
The FDA is not compelled to follow the recommendation from its advisory group, which includes more than a dozen top scientists from across the country – though it often does.
“Following deliberations taking into consideration the available evidence, the FDA will issue revised guidance, if appropriate,” a spokeswoman Jennifer Rodriguez wrote in a statement, though she declined to provide details about who would make the decision or when that could happen.
Members of the advisory committee did not return requests for comment.
A new FDA policy would likely not completely eliminate the ban, instead allowing men to donate only if they have not had sex with another man for one year.
Rep. Mike Quigley (D-Ill.) said that a policy with a one-year deferral would be “still discriminatory” and he hopes the ban will be reversed in full.
"I am encouraged by the continuation of this conversation to change current, outdated policies, which will bring equality for the LGBT community while still protecting the U.S. blood supply,” he wrote in a statement to The Hill.
Yessak, who founded the National Gay Blood Drive, said he believes a complete elimination of the ban is “only a matter of time.”
He pointed to accumulating pressure he’s seen against the policy. Over the last two years, participation has tripled for his blood drive, where gay men show up with “proxies” who donate in their place.
“This is really big,” he said. “It’s a huge step, but there’s a lot more work to do.”
HELL NO.
This is very dangerous and will lead to people fighting against getting blood transfusuion. Everything that can be done to keep this blood safe must be done and not having homosexuals donate is way up on the list.
The homos want you to get sick.
My biggest question is why. Is there such a shortage of blood that we need to take such a risk? Is “removing a stigma” from a very small minority of the population worth the risk? I think obviously not but how in the world do they justify this? What is the rationale? On a side note, why doesn’t anyone point out the recent issues with self reporting and ebola as a cautionary tale.
Obama has only two years left in office and his Fundamental Transition is a long way from completion.
They need to do more to speed up the process of eliminating Bitter Clingers and older generations who remember what it was like to live without the suffocating tyranny of Bat-Crap crazy liberals and communist dictators running the government.
I was wondering how far into the article or thread I would have to read to find this critical piece of information. This fact alone should end the debate and it is a shame it does not.
“Others in my exact same situation do lie because they believe so vehemently that they have the right — forget the right, the ability — to keep the blood supply and the bone marrow supply safe,” he said. “We have the ability to help save lives.”
BS! Narcissistic a holes poorly justifying their narcissism knowing they will never get called on it due to political correctness. It is always all about them and gay men are soooo preoccupied by the state of our blood reserves and just want to help others. /s
I was stationed in Germany 1981-83 and I gave blood after 9-11, only later was I permanently banned because of Mad Cow. Still can’t donate!
But faggies demand their right to infect the rest of society!! Grrr.......
Does anyone remember Kimberly Bergalis!!?
Another Bolshie plot to reduce the carbon footprint of the human race.
Homosexual marriage is equal to heterosexual marriage
Having AIDS is equal to not having AIDS
A contaminated blood supply is equal to a uncontaminated blood supply
I guess they’re just not getting enough new AIDS cases. This should fix that.
Street person with AIDS needs money real bad. Has a blood type they’ll pay for. He has no character, simply answers the questions the way it will serve him best.
Good luck citizens...
They should mark the donated blood LGBT ONLY.
Are they insane???
From the American Red Cross guidelines:
You are not eligible to donate if:
You were a member of the of the U.S. military, a civilian military employee, or a dependent of a member of the U.S. military who spent a total time of 6 months on or associated with a military base in any of the following areas during the specified time frames
From 1980 through 1990 - Belgium, the Netherlands (Holland), or Germany
From 1980 through 1996 - Spain, Portugal, Turkey, Italy or Greece.
Never depend on something that makes sense actually occurring.
...but if you sell raw milk we will kick down your door, shoot your dog and burn the motherf*cker down.
Autologous blood is when you ‘bank’ your own blood prior to surgery.
You can have blood taken from 6 weeks to 5 days before your surgery.
Your blood is stored and is good for a few weeks from the day it is collected.
If your blood is not used during or after surgery, it is thrown away.
How generous of them to want to share their diseases with us.
Is the blood supply so needy that the contribution from less than 2% of the population is really worth the risk of all the diseases they carry?
Yep, just add another factor.
We have A,O,B, -, +: and add in Q.
Then match donors to donees.
I’m permanently banned from donating because I had cancer.
GIVE CANCER BLOOD NOW!!!
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