Perhaps I have been trying to avoid this story but i thought that I should write about it as people keep asking. I can see that it has even featured in the BBC news over this last few days. I am all for equality but I do wonder whether this is taking political correctness too far.
What am I talking about? The UK blanket Ban on gay men giving blood, regardless of their history of testing for blood borne viruses and sexual history. There is currently a campaign for blood equality.
So what do I think? Well I can see the argument that some heterosexuals may also be at significant risk of blood borne viruses and that risk can only be assessed on an individual basis (i.e. some gay men may have no-risk). However the person at risk from infected blood is the recipient of blood rather than the donor. Therefore i think you have to decide whether an increased risk to recipients is justified in order to achieve equality. I would argue NO as even though this risk may be very small the consequence of it can be very severe.
Anyways as you can see I am not the only one with view on this. Here are a few links to a selection of others.
The view of one of the liberal democrats.
Bloodban
The blog of the guy runnning the campaign
The life of a young Welsh Doctor working in Cambridge, living in Stoke Newington
March 08, 2008
Gay blood donors
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1 comments:
I honestly didn't know that gay guys couldn't donate blood.
Thats screwed.
I agree that gay men are more prone to HIV than their respective straight counterparts.. but surely we have gone beyond this kind of discrimination.. surely this shoud be judged on a case by case basis.
Thx for sharing that article.. I've learnt something today.
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