“It just always seemed so ridiculous to me. Harcup, 43, a gay man who lives in Florida. How do they know if a gay man is gay? How do they know for a fact if whether or not potential donors have had intercourse with members of the same sex? And how recently? How do they know that the supposed straight male donors have never had sex with another man before? How do they know if they’re not bisexual?” exclaimed James W. “Here’s the thing: it never made any sense to me as to how they legitimately policed that anyway.
The original ban on donations was born during an era when HIV was not well understood and few men with AIDS survived. However, controversy still surrounds the FDA’s newest guidance, as some say it is continues to be based not on fact but on prejudice. Now, instead of 1 year, if a male has had sex with another male, he need only wait 3 months to donate blood. Red Cross figures in March showed a drop-off of 86,000 fewer blood donations across the United States, due to almost 2700 blood drives that had to be cancelled. The FDA has announced a relaxing of its restrictions on gay men being allowed to donate blood, in light of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic.
