Terrence Higgins Trust:

“We accept that on the surface the current rules initially appear discriminatory and have worked with the National Blood Service to review and improve the quality of their communication with members of the public who are refused, to explain why this is so.”

This briefing by them is old, and therefore perhaps out of date, but provides useful background:

http://www.tht.org.uk/binarylibrary/blloddonationsbypeopleathigherriskofhiv.pdf

In particular,

“We believe that the current policy of the National Blood Service is justifiable and was based on the best available evidence when it was drawn up. Unless a subsequent review finds that risks to the blood service have changed the current policy is sensible and pragmatic.”

I’m not an expert, but I’m inclined to trust THT not to be homphobic.

The THT actually support it on their current website:

http://www.tht.org.uk/informationresources/policy/healthpolicy/blooddonations/isntitdiscrimination/

The idea that the THT would be in any way ‘homophobic’ is stupid. And, as they point out, the fact that women who have sex with women can donate doesn’t exactly suggest homophobia.

The harsh reality is that gay men remain disproportionately at risk of HIV and several other serious STDs which prohibit you from donating blood. Other groups at disproportionate risk are also banned for life:

You should never give blood if:

You have ever had syphilis, HTVL (Human T – lymphotorpic virus), hepatitis B or C or think you may have hepatitis now

You’re a man who’s had sex with another man, even safe sex using a condom.

You’ve ever worked as a prostitute.

You’ve ever injected yourself with drugs – even once.

Fixating on gay men seems the worst kind of identity politics and obscures the awkward questions about why the male gay community remains at such high risk, decades after HIV became known to us all. Yes, it’s a blunt instrument, but I think the reasons for it are clear.

Oh, and as for the point that “People lie about their sexual practices, their drug use and their medical history”…given that the ban applies to ‘men who have sex with men’ and not ‘homosexuals’, I don’t really see why the first point doesn’t apply here? The issue is not that we are more likely to ‘lie’ but that, statistically, we are far more likely to have one of these infections and possibly not know about it.

May I offer a post discussing an alternative view and grounded in the science behind the blood ban http://is.gd/O00Syd

So, back to lying on forms again eh?

Puzzle: isn’t donated blood tested anyway before being used? Or could blood that tests negative still transmit disease?

And isn’t: “Have you had sex with a man in the past ten years?” likely to evoke unreliable responses from all the married men who have had the odd little adventure? (I’ve met a few in my time!)

@Jonathan

Yes, all blood is tested. The problem is that tests don’t return positive as soon as you are infected. Depending on what kind of test is used, it could take up to three months before it would get a positive result.

“People lie about their sexual practices, their drug use and their medical history – all of which could potentially lead to infected blood ending up in the blood bank. But homosexual people are no more likely to lie about these things than heterosexual people, and to assume otherwise is unacceptable discrimination.”

Who’s assuming that? I think the issue is that gay men are more likely to have HIV in the first place. So you would predict a higher amount of infected blood from this group. You wouldn’t need them to be more likely to lie about it to reach that conclusion.

Of course, if the assumption that gay men are more likely than other groups to have HIV is untrue, then the rules are stupid. Also, if the number of people who would lie about (or not be aware of) having HIV is statistically negligible. But I don’t like the idea of putting recipients of blood at unneeded risk just to avoid giving offense.

@Steven

Thanks.

But wouldn’t “Have you had sex with a man in the past year?” give a sufficient margin for error?

Even so the question may well not produce a reliable result – only the more confident kind of bisexual man would find it easy to answer truthfully.

This is why it is currently not good public policy to recieve blood donations from active gay men: http://lawandsexuality.blogspot.com/2011/02/drug-and-disease-free-queer-culture.html

I am not against anyone taking as many risks as they want with their own bodies, but that is no reason to implicate other people’s health with that behaviour.

@Jonathan

When looking at this issue they do statistical risk assessments, mentioned in the THT article referenced in the first comment:

“Based on the best available data at the time, the HPA suggested that a full lifting of the ban would increase the risk of HIV entering blood stocks by 500 per cent, while a partial removal – excluding only men who had had sex with men in the past 12 months – could increase the risk by around 60 per cent. ”

I assume they have done this again with the current review.

@Chaise Guevara

I’m an old poof who has seen vast and welcome changes in social attitudes over the last 50 years, and I don’t regard the ban on gay men giving blood as “homophobic”, just precautionary and sensible.

Even so the terms of the ban might be queried – not least because of the difficulty of getting reliable answers from bisexual men (especially the “marginal” ones).

@Steven

Thanks again.

It’s quite right that no risks should be taken – and it leaves me feeling free of any guilt that I haven’t given blood… Though since a caught a dose of the pox in 1975 (happily diagnosed and cured early) I’d have been excluded anyway.

Seriously? Aren’t there thousadns of more important things to get would up about than this latest story of psuedo discrimination??

42% of new HIV infections in 2009/10 were to homosexual men.

HIV has a fairly long gestation time so can easily be missed in tests carried out on donated blood. Testing is also fairly expensive.

It’s not a matter of discrimination – it’s a matter of practicality, much the same reason you can’t give blood if you have been to some high risk disease areas around the world.

Get over it.

Hm, bearing in mind that straight people can get AIDS as well and I think I read somewhere that incidence is growing faster than for gay people (possibly because of the lie that AIDS is a gays-only disease, alongside growing awareness/precautions amongst gay people) why isn’t there a ban on straight people donating blood? why don’t they – if minimising risk is the main thing here – ban everyone except celibates & virgins?

@3 “the fact that women who have sex with women can donate doesn’t exactly suggest homophobia.” :- not necessarily, more that lesbians don’t have half the same stigma surrounding sexual activity (which is why certain blokes love to watch lesbian porn but would blanche if their partner watched gay porn; or why Tipping the Velvet was very popular whereas Queer as Folk got condemned by every redtop (& a few “quality” papers) going).

@Tyler

That’s what’s so stupid about this ’cause’. The bans very clearly apply to high-risk groups. Rather than recognising that gay men remain a high-risk group and facing the difficult questions that poses about our sexual behaviour, we instead scream ‘discrimination’ and resort to anecdotal defences based on the fact that we as individuals use condoms or whatever. The blood service isn’t there to confirm our self-image. It’s there to provide safe blood and the decisions they take are based solely on that aim.

@14

“42% of new HIV infections in 2009/10 were to homosexual men. ”

So… who was in that 58%?

@Mr S. Pill

“I think I read somewhere” isn’t much of an argument. In 2010 there were 2363 men who have sex with me diagnosed with HIV. There were 626 heterosexuals diagnosed. Even adjusted for those believed to have contracted HIV and not been diagnosed, the heterosexual figure is one third of the men who have sex with men one. Women who have sex with women are not a high-risk group. That’s the brutal, simple truth behind the ban.

“Men who have safe sex with other men, including men in civil partnerships or committed relationships, are still being discriminated against.”

Ultimately it’s about the patient, not the donor.

The blood service is incredibly risk averse- my Dad can no longer give blood, having donated for many years, because he had surgery, in 1980, that required blood donations. This is due to the theoretical risk of transmission of nvCJD (ironically, he’s been a vegetarian for about the same amount of time). Compare this with a well documented increased risk of serious blood borne disease amongst men who have sex with men.

This question should be decided based on clinical evidence and patient safety, not politics.

“So… who was in that 58%?”

Bear in mind that men who have sex with men form a much smaller proportion of the population. Once you convert those numbers into rates for each population, the disproportion is huge.

@14

“42% of new HIV infections in 2009/10 were to homosexual men. ”

So… who was in that 58%?

Apart from what Hannah said above, 70% of heterosexual HIV cases in 2010 were contracted abroad. Hence why you’re banned if you’ve recently been in certain countries.

So… who was in that 58%?

The 98% or so of the population who aren’t homosexual men? In other words, 1-2% of the population (less than that according to the latest research) made up 42% of HIV infections. Which would seem to make that a distinctly high risk group, no?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-11398629

So… who was in that 58%

The 99% or so of the UK population who aren’t homosexual men?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-11398629

“70% of heterosexual HIV cases in 2010 were contracted abroad.” And that doesn’t include transmission from other high risk activities, like prostitution and IV drug use. In addition there will be those who contracted it from those in the above categories, all of whom are barred from donating blood.

There is a large body of good quality evidence that accepting blood donations from men who have sex with men would significantly increase the risk of accidental HIV and hepatitis c transmission. Most people involved in this research are not homophobic they are just being pragmatic. In the same way refusing donations from people from sub-Sahara Africa is not racist.

@ 15 Mr S the Pill

“Hm, bearing in mind that straight people can get AIDS as well and I think I read somewhere that incidence is growing faster than for gay people (possibly because of the lie that AIDS is a gays-only disease, alongside growing awareness/precautions amongst gay people) why isn’t there a ban on straight people donating blood? why don’t they – if minimising risk is the main thing here – ban everyone except celibates & virgins?”

Because you wouldn’t get anywhere near enough blood (and celibates and virgins could have AIDs too, so by your logic they’d also be banned).

It’s not a case of saying “gays have AIDs, straights don’t”. It’s a case of limiting the danger by removing an at-risk group. I really, really don’t think we should allow people to catch a serious disease simply out of a desire to be politically correct.

“So, back to lying on forms again eh?”

If you read the linked article you’ll see that the Blood Service already thinks that people do this in order to donate.

I think the OP has rather got this the wrong way around anyway. The way I read the explanation was “we used to exclude all gay men, just as we exclude anyone who has ever had the clap, received a blood transfusion etc. However, modern sex/gender discrimination laws seem to mean that we can no longer do this. So we’re going to have some other rule which has the same effect instead. Stupid sex/gender discrimination laws.”

“not necessarily, more that lesbians don’t have half the same stigma surrounding sexual activity”

Oh dear lord. Please, can someone explain the mechanics of sex to Mr. Pill again? The risks from hard ons, penetration and ejaculation, that direct sharing of body fluids, are very different from the odd bit of rug munching. For the same reasons male to female transmission rates are vastly higher than female to male……and oddly, the porn industry’s fascination with face shots reduces tranmission rates there.

@everyone

I’m happy to be proven wrong, & I’ve no great strong feelings about this, I just think if there’s going to be discrimination against a particular set of people it needs to have excellent justification. It may be that this discrimination is necessary, & some arguments are swaying me.

@Tim W

Thanks for the biology lesson, but that doesn’t actually refute any point I made about the stigma surrounding gay women sex vs gay man sex.

It’s a bit disappointing that, although not responding to the points raised here, the author has asked (link: http://bit.ly/fSk9Ap) the editor of SoSoGay to write a blogpost for her based on his supportive comment on the mirror of this article over at Total Politics (http://bit.ly/fWrDbj – received 2 comments total).

The editor of SoSoGay stating that “Is anything being done to prevent straight people who have unprotected sex from donating? Of course not” demonstrates that he hasn’t put the slightest bit of effort into investigating the reality of this issue.

@27 Yeah, I know that they know that people already lie on the forms, appears that that situation will not be changing any time soon.
The real question is, how much overlap is there between those gay people wishing to donate blood honestly, and those apparently making up over 40% on new HIV infections?
Because I’m under the impression that there really isn’t much of one, truth be told. At least I’ve yet to see such advocacy groups as “bare-backers for blood donation”, or “bug-chasers blood transfusion alliance”.

Back in the 80s I remember the ad ‘don’t die of ignorance’, in fact a large amount of money was spent on AIDS awareness and, at the time, this drew criticism from several right-wing papers, I remember Littlejohn and his ‘you couldn’t make it up’ when it was found that the number of AIDS cases decreased rather than increased as was being predicted. Most sensible people proposed that the impact of the ads was such, that sexually active people ,who were not in a monogamous relationship, started to use condoms. This was certainly true of one study of prostitutes.
The driving force behind AIDS ads was indeed ignorance, and that was based on the then public’s perception that AIDS was a gay disease. I suspect that the changing of the rules for blood donation and the debate which follows will serve to reinforce the same ignorance as before.

@ 31 Cylux

“The real question is, how much overlap is there between those gay people wishing to donate blood honestly, and those apparently making up over 40% on new HIV infections?”

Off the top of my head (do you mind if I swap “gay” for “men who have had sex with men” in the above sentence?), you’d have three groups of people lying on the forms here:

1) People who want to donate and know they don’t have HIV.
2) People who are still in the closet or have another reason for hiding who they’ve slept with, but someone asks them to come along and donate and they can’t come up with an excuse quick enough.
3) People who are so angry about the claimed “discrimination” that they donate despite not being sure whether they have HIV.

Group 2 is your main problem there. Group 1 is fine, for obvious reasons, and I reckon Group 3 is vanishingly small (and anyway, you wouldn’t stop people like that by changing the rules). And Group 2 has equivalents for a lot of the other questions that might have embarrassing or compromising answers – you might not want to admit you slept with someone while abroad within your lover’s hearing, for example!

I know one guy who had to call his girlfriend, who had recently been to Africa, and get her to confirm she hadn’t cheated on him before they let him donate blood. There’s an obvious conflict of interest there.

@18. Steven

“In 2010 there were 2363 men who have sex with *me* diagnosed with HIV.” Sure beats my record!

A propos numbers, there have been 4-5% gay men in every group I’ve worked in (including women as well as men in the 100%) – student class, school staffroom, office, Norfolk County Council, local party executive.

@ 28 S the Pill

“Thanks for the biology lesson, but that doesn’t actually refute any point I made about the stigma surrounding gay women sex vs gay man sex.”

You’re right, it doesn’t, and that stigma does exist. But are you sure it’s relevant here? Given that male/male sex is more likely to transmit HIV (AFAIK) than male/female or female/female sex, is it actually necessary to seek out motivations here other than safety?

@35 Chaise

“is it actually necessary to seek out motivations here other than safety?”

Like I say above, if discrimination is necessary on grounds of health then it has to be justified extremely well IMO – my point was that it’s not good enough to say “the ban isn’t homophobic because lesbians can donate”, it doesn’t really ring true to me. It’s like saying (for example) some cliched homophobe who “hates queers” isn’t homophobic because he likes watching women have sex with each other. The ban may not be homophobic on other grounds ofcourse.

Someone round here recently denied that political correctness exists. This issue is a perfect example of why it does. In the 1980s, gay men were needlessly dying in San Francisco because gay activists refused to admit that this new disease was strongly correlated with attendance at the city’s famous bathhouses. Anyone who pointed out the evidence was damned as a homophobe. Some years later, gay men needlessly died because gay activists refused to support “safe sex” campaigns targeted at those at the highest risk — because to do so might encourage those who called HIV a “gay plague”. And now we have gay activists apparently fine with infected blood being used for transfusions, rather than admit the truth about the epidemiology of HIV. How many more people have to die in order for the inconvenient truth to remain hidden?

Here’s an idea — how about allowing active homosexual men to give blood, but have it reserved for other active homosexual men in need of a blood transfusion, if they so request it. How many do you think would choose it?

@ S Pill

I’m with you – you’re suspicious of something like an anti-Muslim group that says “we’re not bigots, we’ve got Hindu members!” Fair enough. Data provided in the thread does seem to argue that the policy is sensible, though.

Further to your virgins/celibates point above, I should point out that if demand for blood was a lot lower, it could make sense to only allow virgins to donate.

Given that male/male sex is more likely to transmit HIV (AFAIK) than male/female or female/female sex, is it actually necessary to seek out motivations here other than safety?

Anal penetrative sex carries the highest risk rate of HIV transmission, then vaginal penetrative sex, followed by (to a significantly lesser degree, you need a cut in your mouth or something) oral sex. Tribbing as far as I am aware is pretty damn safe, as I imagine frotting is as well.

Of course the exact question asked isn’t really highlighted, there’s plenty of gay guys who would never do anal neither topping nor bottoming so “sex in ten years” isn’t exactly as clear as you might think. I mean what if a gay couple only had sex by bagpiping? Does that count?

@ 39

I would have assumed that male/male sex referred to anal sex. Is this not clarified on the form? It should be.

However, you presumably are still at a higher risk having male/male anal sex than male/female anal sex, because the prevalance of HIV is far more common in gay men to begin with, so you’re a lot more likely to be with someone who has it.

For the same reason, you would be a lot more likely to contract it through having oral sex with a gay man than a straight man or a woman. Although I don’t know how “gay, sexually active but never has anal sex” compares as a risk profile to “straight, sexually active and has vaginal sex”. I’m also not sure how likely you are to contract HIV orally even assuming your partner has it.

@39 To be honest if it did indeed clarify it as “Question for men only; Have you had anal penetrative sex with another man within the last 10 years”, then that would be a stretch to call homophobic, excludes a significant amount of sexually active gay men for sure, but not all.
You could argue that the question should be for both genders “have you had anal sex within the last ten years”, but since that would pretty much result in the blood supply drying up it’s probably not a good idea.

While it is possible to contract various blood-borne diseases via oral sex it generally requires specific circumstances in order to do so, http://hivinsite.ucsf.edu/hiv?page=basics-00-08

Bah. @40 even.

How about looking at this from the ‘user’ perspective:

- homosexual men can donate without questions

- where the blood is used for a routine operation the patient is asked whether they would prefer blood donated by homosexual men or others, having been given the statistics the Transfusion Service uses

- where it is an emergency then the ‘others’ option applies by default as per Transfusion Service proposals.

Wonder what would happen?

http://www.pinknews.co.uk/2010/01/04/gay-son-prevented-from-donating-blood-to-dying-mother/

Just remembered that there is an actual horror story to go with this topic.

What Anne Milton means is that essentially, sexually active gay men are still as good as banned, unless they’re of an age when they can no longer do it (or give blood, for that matter).

So I’ve been in a monogamous relationship with a healthy sex life for the last four years. I’m not carrying anything (I get checked regularly) and so does my boyfriend. But according to the National Blood Transfusion Service, I’m still unclean.

It doesn’t account for the fact that heterosexual people can lie about their HIV status, or other blood-borne diseases- just like us gays can I suppose. But in that case why impose a blanket ban?

Maybe it’s my general ignorance of things medical or scientific, I’m utterly disgusted with this decision – which in a weird sort of way is even more discriminatory than the original policy.

@ 41

“To be honest if it did indeed clarify it as “Question for men only; Have you had anal penetrative sex with another man within the last 10 years”, then that would be a stretch to call homophobic, excludes a significant amount of sexually active gay men for sure, but not all.”

I don’t think it’s homophobic because it’s for obvious pragmatic reasons. However, anything non-pragmatic prejudiced against people who have anal sex probably IS homophobic – anti-sodomy laws, for example. You have to consider the motive for things like that. If there was no such thing as homosexuality, I soubt sodomy would ever have been a crime.

“You could argue that the question should be for both genders “have you had anal sex within the last ten years”, but since that would pretty much result in the blood supply drying up it’s probably not a good idea.”

Really? I suddenly feel really vanilla.

@ 45 Paul

“So I’ve been in a monogamous relationship with a healthy sex life for the last four years. I’m not carrying anything (I get checked regularly) and so does my boyfriend. But according to the National Blood Transfusion Service, I’m still unclean.”

No, you’re not “unclean”. It really doesn’t help to put words like that into people’s mouths. What you are is in an at-risk group, and allowing people in that group – not you personally, but on average – to give blood is considered, for statistical reasons, to put blood recipients at too high a risk. That’s all. It’s not about labelling you, it’s about risk analysis.

“It doesn’t account for the fact that heterosexual people can lie about their HIV status, or other blood-borne diseases- just like us gays can I suppose. But in that case why impose a blanket ban?”

It does account for that. It’s just that because gay people are so much more likely to carry HIV, the risks are much, much higher. It’s not that you’re more likely to lie, it’s that you are more likely to have HIV.

Nobody is saying that all gay people have AIDS, far less that gay people are “unclean” or “dirty”. And if anyone does say that, they can fuck right off. It’s just that a higher percentage of sexually active gay/bi men have HIV than sexually active women or straight men, and from a purely scientific standpoint it’s not worth the risk to the people who get the blood.

@ 43

We probably should take blood from gay men and other at-risk groups and use it when it’s a life-or-death situation and there’s no other blood to be had. However, I think* that blood is mixed together for storage rather than being kept in a seperate container for each donor. And in that case, one person’s blood could infect the entire lot. If I’m wrong, then there’s no reason we shouldn’t allow at-risk groups to donate.

*and may well be wrong

But I suppose the huge increase in all kinds of viruses and diseases due to the years of unchecked immigration from Third World/developing countries (not just a group of people!, but whole COUNTRIES) where such diseases are quite frankly rampant is i’m sure perfectly fine with all you moral Lefties.

After all only BNP Nazis are against mass and virtually unchecked (literally) immigration from 3rd world countries. Right?

SOOOO much easier and ‘moral’ for you lot to target Homosexuals.
Your rabidly Homophobic Islamic mates would be pleased too.

And wow! Given the rampant AIDS crises in Africa (where of course people come into the UK from routinely…what was that about statistics Chaise Guevara??) most of the country must be practicing Homosexuals using the logic oh here! Yes?

Idiots and hypocrites rule here.

Meanwhile in Australia, I’m banned from giving blood because I lived in the UK in the 1980s, and they’re still terrified of an imaginary epidemic that never happened. But I’m not going to chalk that one down to racism, ether.

After the haemophiliac HIV and Hep C scandals of the 1980s, blood services worldwide are going to be gibberingly, unreasonably paranoid about absolutely anything that could hypothetically kill people / get blood services sued / get their managers put in jail. Which – given that unlike organ donation, running out of blood is very rare – is probably not an unreasonable attitude.

If people were dying due to lack of blood, then it would be a much harder question to address. But they aren’t.

Hmm, interesting double-use of “unreasonably” by me above. “Paranoid far beyond anything that would medically be justified” / “For understandable reasons that, if a bit daft, are still better than the anything-goes attitude prevailing in the 1970s and early 1980s”.

@ 49 Davey Boy

“SOOOO much easier and ‘moral’ for you lot to target Homosexuals.
Your rabidly Homophobic Islamic mates would be pleased too.”

Who exactly is “targeting” homosexuals? I love the way you have to drag Islam into every conversation, by the way. You must be fun at parties.

“And wow! Given the rampant AIDS crises in Africa (where of course people come into the UK from routinely…what was that about statistics Chaise Guevara??) most of the country must be practicing Homosexuals using the logic oh here! Yes?”

No.

I know you find thinking difficult, so let me help here. The fact that practising gay people in the UK are at a higher risk of HIV than average has no bearing whatsoever on the percentage of Africans who are gay. You’re not using the logic employed in this thread, you’re using insane troll logic.

“Idiots and hypocrites rule here.”

It was fine till you turned up and sprayed your ignorant shit everywhere.

I don’t understand why this change in the rules is worse than what was there before, but as progress goes it’s far from adequate.

It is true that there is a higher prevalence of HIV/AIDS among gay and bisexual men.However, both the lifetime and 10-year ban go far beyond restrictions that could be justified on purely medical or empirical grounds.

42% of new cases of HIV/AIDS are among gay and bisexual men. But 95% of gay and bisexual men do not have HIV/AIDS, and a huge proportion of them cannot even be considered at risk of having it. Many men who could safely donate are not allowed to do so. Consider the following:

* A woman who has had sex with a man who has had sex with other men is only banned for a year

* A man who has only ever had protected oral sex with other men is banned despite being at negligible risk of contracting HIV.

* A monogamous same-sex couple is banned

For reasons best known to themselves, THT do not oppose the ban. However, others such as the National Aids Trust do:
http://www.nat.org.uk/News-and-Media/Press-Releases/2008/November/Restrictions-on-Donating-Blood.aspx

Potential donors could be asked something like the following two questions:

* Have you had anal sex with another man in the past six months?
* Have you had a negative HIV test in the past three months?

Men who answered no to the first question and yes to the second could safely donate – and that would be far more people than can donate at present (SaBTO apparently think very few gay men go for long periods of time without having sex, which I think many gay men would be rather surprised to hear).

Finally: lots of the discussion on this topic overlooks the fact that there are straight men and bisexual men who have had sex with men in the past but not recently. I suspect if all of those people were honest, the pool of potential donors would be significantly smaller than it is at the moment.

I think it is quite clear that the National Blood Service hate:
Gay men
Prostitutes
Ex-prostitutes
Drug-users
Ex-drug users
Anyone who’s received blood

Or maybe they are making the best possible judgement to ensure safe blood. The idea that the policy is homophobic just seems a bit silly to me. I can see why people might take it personally (“I’m not unclean etc…”) but I don’t think that helpful or reasonable.

Simply, the blood service know that some people will lie in order to give blood (not you or me obviously…) and if you multiply this risk by someone being in an at-risk group then you are approaching the level of risk that is unacceptable.

Of course HIV is not a gay disease. However, in the western world, for various reasons it is much more common in the homosexual population. It is similarly more common amoungst prostitutes and drug-users. (And it’s not just about HIV).

So if you were responsible for policy for a blood service what do you do? Well looking at the amount of blood that is needed compared to the risk of accepting blood from various groups (Because it is not really possible to assess an individual’s risk – and arguably trying to would be a breach of confidentiality) you make a decision as to who you will and will not take blood from. It is simply a risk-assessment not a prejudice about any group.

We do not have a severe shortage of donors in the UK – in general donations manage to keep up with demand.

FWIW, whether donations are pooled or not depends on what you are talking about – a ‘unit of blood’ means concentrated red-blood cells and they are not pooled. (I think we’re still important from the US due to the worry about CJD but I’m not sure). FFP (fresh frozen plasma) is another blood product with is life saving in people who have clotting disorders – typically this comes from around 40 different donors to make one unit.

There is one argument in favour of changing the rules – the best donors, generally speaking are young men. This is because young women have the habit of having babies and if they’re not, menstuating which makes them unable to safely give blood as often. (It is a biological fact that a significant proportion of women are borderline anaemic every month). The risk of anaemia (to men and women) is why they do the finger-prick test before you give blood. Hence the one group that you really want to encourage to become regular donors is young men. Given that young gay men are by definition young men they are the part of this group. Unfortunately young gay men also tend to be active in gay-sex. So this policy does mean excluding a number of potential ‘ideal’ donors. On the other hand if the risk increase is significant then clearly this is the right decision.

I think it not helpful or constructive to second-guess the blood service making this choice on the basis of the best evidence just because we may not like the decision.

AFZ

Good posts both from AG1985 and alienfromzog. Just because the system isn’t homophobic doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be improved and refined where possible. And I guess eventually HIV in homosexual men should move towards the levels seen in the rest of the population, so we shouldn’t hold on to this policy past the point when it ceases to be sensible.

So can’t the gay liberation mafia do any better than this? Times gone by are littered with stories of real persecution of the likes of Wilde and Turing. But this column is just whinging about a percieved official slight . The take home message it gives is that gay persecution is over.

@56 Well, except for the guys who still get beaten to death by white skin-head types for being perceived to be gay anyway…

@ 65

“The take home message it gives is that gay persecution is over.”

Because gays are now completely fairly treated in Britain. They’re not persecuted as outsiders by idiots, or condemned as unnatural or evil by any political or religious groups, and they can get married like the rest of us. Oh, wait…

@ 56, even!

It’s pure hypocrisy of Liberal Conspiracy to pretend outrage on this when this is where the Blessed Unity salivated over the scandal of a gay conservative looking at gay pornography, going on gay dating sites, and mentioned six times in one paragraph that said politican was, er, ‘gay’, before topping it all off with the old familar gay=paedophile smear. And he still hasn’t had the decency to apologise for his disgraceful tactics.

Its not only suits supremely homophobic, its supremely stupid. The LGBT community do alot to deal with STDs in their community. You cannot walk into a gay bar without being offered condoms and lube. At our uni, the lgbt society do alot to make sure their members know about the risks, by giving talks to giving new members packs of condoms etc. Arguably, they know more about the risks than straight people.

@61 That’s pretty much what I was getting at above when I asked about overlap. I somehow doubt that those who ignore all that to get a thrill out of barebacking are the type to start donating blood in the first place.

@ 60 Lamia

“It’s pure hypocrisy of Liberal Conspiracy to pretend outrage on this when this is where the Blessed Unity salivated over the scandal of a gay conservative looking at gay pornography etc etc etc”

Hardly, considering that Liberal Conspiracy withdrew that article after deciding it was inappopriate. You’re basing your point on the idea that all LC contributers are one moral being, and even after allowing you that error it STILL doesn’t make sense.

61. Sam Lentileatinglefty

The (almost certainly true) fact that gay people are more aware of AIDs and the like than straights does not change the fact that gay men are far, far more likely to be HIV-positive than other groups by sexuality and gender. So no, it’s neither homophobic or stupid, it’s simply sensible.