UCSF Mission Bay blood donor clinic Wednesday

On Wednesday, October 5th, the UCSF Mobile Blood Clinic will be taking blood donations from 11AM-3PM on 4th St at its Mission Bay campus. This is great, and everyone who's able ought to come and give blood. But one kind of person who is still unable to donate is any man who has had sex with another man, even once, since 1977. The argument starts with the window of time between initial infection and detection, and the fear that a man who has recently become infected with HIV will donate blood during this window and will unknowingly infect the blood supply.  In 1983, the science around the length of this window was nascent. Today, with advances in science, that window is known to be but a few months, yet in the US, the lifetime ban on donation continues to discriminate against millions of Americans.

In 1983, the Federal government took a knee-jerk reaction and outright banned gay and bisexual men from donating blood for anything but research purposes. For 28 years, gay and bisexual men have been denied the ability to help save lives because of regulations based not in science, but in fear. To many, the argument for retaining the ban and keeping the blood supply safe outweigh any discrimination directed toward gay men. However, prior to blood donation, men are simply asked if they've had a same-sex encounter since 1977. It's naive to believe that this is sufficient to keep all gay and bisexual men from donating blood, and so all blood is rightly tested for a wide range of diseases, including HIV. So if gay men are lying and are donating blood already, blood is being tested prior to entering the blood supply, and for nearly thirty years there have been few, if any cases of HIV transmission through the public blood supply, why are gay men sill banned from donating openly?

If you are a man who's had unprotected sex with 1000 female prostitutes since 1977, a prostitute who's had unprotected sex with 1000 men, or are a past or current drug user who shares needles, and have never been tested for HIV, you can donate blood on Wednesday. However, if you're an HIV-negative gay man who's been in a monogamous relationship for thirty years and gets an annual HIV test, you can't.

The Department of Health and Human Services has identified four areas of study needed before considering lifting the ban:

* how the risk of blood transmissible diseases in the current donor population relate to risk factors in donors;
* the root cause of Quarantine Release Errors, or the accidental release of blood not cleared for use;
* if potential donors correctly understand the current questionnaire and if men who have sex with men would comply with modified deferral criteria; and
* if alternative screening strategy, such as pre- and post-qualifying donation infectious disease testing, for men who have sex with men would assure blood safety while enabling collection of data that could demonstrate safe blood collection.

http://www.washingtonblade.com/2011/07/27/hhs-to-study-lifting-ban-on-gay-blood-donors/

News that HHS is creeping forward on lifting the ban is encouraging. Other countries, such as Canada, are also doing similar studies. Others have already made adjustments to their policies. Australia, Sweden, and Japan have all reduced the permanent ban to 12-months between a man's last sexual encounter with another man and blood donation. The UK has just recently decided to follow suit, and in South Africa, it has been reduced to a six-month period.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-14824310

It's time for HHS to get their studies done and to join with other nations in changing it's policies to reflect the science that has already been done in support of the change. It's also incumbent upon institutions like UCSF to bring this issue up every time there is a blood drive in which hundreds of its own employees are forbidden from donating for no good scientific reason.