Red Cross to Call for End to Gay Blood Donor Ban
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It's about time:
The ARC and the FDA have had something of an incestuous relationship regarding the gay blood ban, with the ARC insisting that it was an FDA policy and the FDA insisting that the ARC supported it. Meanwhile, in the pharmaceutical arena, the FDA almost always adopts the recommendations of its advisory panels. Hopefully the same deference to experts will finally prevail here.
Of course, the reaction in the anti-gay community will be swift and vicious, as it always is. Expect gobbledygook such as "people's lives will be put at risk to promote an agenda" and such. Of course, the real risk is from having too little blood in our blood banks, but so what -- the "gay lifestyle" must be opposed at all costs (especially in an election year), right? Maybe there will even be some proposals for state constitutional amendments banning the use of gay blood.
The people who tend to be rabidly anti-gay also tend to be rabidly anti-science (e.g., "Intelligent Design"). The hysteria from religious fundamentalists and the pandering politicians who cater to them will be loud, ugly and wrong. But for the most part we are winning the war of ideas on the science-versus-religion front. Perhaps a similarly favorable trend will emerge on this very important public health and gay equality issue.
In any event, congratulations to the American Red Cross for (finally) being on the right side of history.
(Cross-posted at Spectrum Bloggers.)
Officials from the American Red Cross, speaking at a recent blood donation conference in Maryland, called for an end to the federal government's ban on gay and bisexual blood donors, the Washington Blade reports.The shift in position had been widely anticipated in the days before the FDA conference.
A Food and Drug Administration policy in place since 1985 bans donations from any man who's ever had sex with another man -- even one time -- since 1977. Even gay men who've tested negative for HIV antibodies and those who are in monogamous relationships are barred for life from donating blood.
...
"The [American Association of Blood Banks, America's Blood Centers] and ARC believe that the current lifetime deferral for men who have had sex with other men is medically and scientifically unwarranted and recommend that deferral criteria be modified and made compatible with criteria for other groups at increased risk for sexual transmission of transfusion-transmitted infections," the groups said in a joint statement issued at the advisory panel meeting.
The ARC and the FDA have had something of an incestuous relationship regarding the gay blood ban, with the ARC insisting that it was an FDA policy and the FDA insisting that the ARC supported it. Meanwhile, in the pharmaceutical arena, the FDA almost always adopts the recommendations of its advisory panels. Hopefully the same deference to experts will finally prevail here.
Of course, the reaction in the anti-gay community will be swift and vicious, as it always is. Expect gobbledygook such as "people's lives will be put at risk to promote an agenda" and such. Of course, the real risk is from having too little blood in our blood banks, but so what -- the "gay lifestyle" must be opposed at all costs (especially in an election year), right? Maybe there will even be some proposals for state constitutional amendments banning the use of gay blood.
The people who tend to be rabidly anti-gay also tend to be rabidly anti-science (e.g., "Intelligent Design"). The hysteria from religious fundamentalists and the pandering politicians who cater to them will be loud, ugly and wrong. But for the most part we are winning the war of ideas on the science-versus-religion front. Perhaps a similarly favorable trend will emerge on this very important public health and gay equality issue.
In any event, congratulations to the American Red Cross for (finally) being on the right side of history.
(Cross-posted at Spectrum Bloggers.)
Related Posts (on one page):
- The Blood Donor Dilemma, Revisited
- Canada Imposes Backward, Poorly Disclosed Gay Organ Ban
- Let's Not Forget the Other Scandalous Gay Ban
- (Not Enough) Blood on Their Hands
- Red Cross to Call for End to Gay Blood Donor Ban
- Red Cross Shakeup an Opportunity to Revisit Gay Blood Ban?
- FDA Takes a Giant Step Backwards
- On the Gay Blood Ban
Posted by Kip on
14 March 2006
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