When first clusters of AIDS cases appeared in 1981 in the US, they left the medical professionals reeling and with a feeling of helplessness. This mysterious disease ravaged the immune systems of the afflicted, turning overnight these vibrantly healthy young men into withered old husks that begged to be put out of their misery. Doctors and nurses could only watch silently, unable to offer any remedy. Without a cure or a treatment, the next best thing was damage control.
Initial countermeasures
The FDA reacted surprisingly quickly and instituted an outright ban on all gay blood donations in 1983. Men who admitted to having even one incident of gay sex were banned from giving blood for life. Ten years later, this ban was softened and replaced with several redundant layers of risk factor evaluation, such as questionnaires and prolonged deferment.
This wasn’t directed at gays specifically, since donors with other questionable life habits were also either rejected or deferred indefinitely, meaning their blood was collected and stored yet never used for transfusion.
There is a solid body of proof that supports the gay blood ban. Gay men comprise only 2% of the US population but account for two thirds of all HIV-positive cases. In addition to HIV, hepatitis and syphilis occur at a much greater rate among gays. In short, the fact is that they are much more likely to have debilitating blood-borne diseases, so it makes sense to reject blood donations from them. Although tests were invented and perfected to help with the screening of blood samples, there is always a chance of error.
Let’s presume that all HIV testing methods currently employed on blood donations in the US have a combined accuracy of 99.99%, meaning that 1 in 10,000 infected blood donations slips through the cracks. According to the Red Cross statistics, there are 15.7 million blood donations in the US in a year, which means 1,570 HIV-infected blood samples are given to unknowing patients.
How accurate are the tests? Nobody can tell, and that’s the profound irony—the blood screening system is invisible when it works.
But now, the gay-friendly Obama administration pushed for FDA to reconsider its gay blood ban and on July 14 we will finally get to know if and in what manner blood donations from gays can be accepted. The most likely outcome is that the lifetime ban clause is replaced with a one-year ban, counting from the last incident of gay sex. Again, this “countermeasure” relies on the candor of a group known for their promiscuity and numerous illicit liasons.
Trapped under guilt
In the UK, the same ban was lifted in 2011 because it was in violation of equality legislation, even though it is possible for HIV in blood to be completely invisible to all known HIV tests for a certain length of time, which is the so-called “window period.” Even when the ban was in place, the relevant UK authorities estimated that around 7% of gay men lied about their sexual history and still donated blood.
In Northern Ireland in 2013, a born-again Christian gay prostitute challenged the lifetime gay blood ban in court on the basis of prejudice, prompting the judge to order the ban lifted. The reasoning given in the verdict was that England, Wales, and Scotland have already lifted the bans themselves, so the increase in risk will be “very minimal.”
Then-minister of health, Edwin Poots, was pelted with criticism because he was unable to provide his own studies and research material justifying the ban.
Creeping equality
As you might imagine, the Democrats in Congress have smelled blood and are already pushing for more equality. In a letter sent to FDA and penned Tuesday (July 14th), senators Elizabeth Warren and Tammy Baldwin demand that more steps be taken towards full equality when it comes to donating blood. The letter states:
Neither our current blood donation policy, nor the proposed one year deferral for MSM (men who have sex with other men), allows the many healthy gay and bisexual men across America to donate blood. This serves to perpetuate the stereotype that all men who have sex with men pose a risk to the health of others
The letter also suggests that criteria for accepting blood donations from transgender persons be considered next.
No escape
In this situation, gay people are being used as ammunition by the progressive left to affect change in the medical profession and society at large, contrary to all facts and reason. It doesn’t matter that the consequences are far-reaching and potentially disastrous to the public health, as long as gays gain even a smidgen of perceived “equality.”
The actual victims of lifting the gay blood ban are the random people and innocent bystanders who desperately need blood transfusions: babies undergoing surgery or car accident victims. In a nutshell, this is what the push for equality is all about, it’s not to uplift the gays, but to bring everyone down to their level — if gay people have HIV, hepatitis, and syphilis, so should everyone else.
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