[strela]

I'm in the same boat as you were, but for a different cause. I can no longer donate blood due to simply having lived in Britain in 1980 (possible exposure to Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD)). I was stationed there while in the Navy. However, that was the FDA's mandate, not one by the Red Cross.

I am completely asymptomatic and have never suffered even one moment of CJD or other prion-related illness. Up until a couple of years ago, when I was refused from donating blood due to this new mandate, I had never heard of the condition and had donated at least 5 gallons of blood previously. Further, there is no record of any prion-based illness ever being transmitted via blood transfusion, I had received no reports of anyone becoming ill as the result of using my blood, and there is not even any test for the condition that I know of.

I find it very hard to believe that any disease could allegedly have an incubation period of 23 years.

No wonder the blood banks are so chronically short of product - the chicken**** rules and hassle laid down by some wizened bureaucrat somewhere prohibit many otherwise willing potential donors from helping out.

I can state with some confidence that if I drop dead tomorrow, it won't be because of CJD.

[Norman Conquest]

And yet it took years of hard-fought battle to exclude HIV risk groups from the donor pool. The brave folks who dared speak for common sense against political correctness have saved countless lives and are still reviled for it.