It’s #WorldBloodDonorDay – unless you’re a gay or bi man

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Today, hundreds of donors across the globe are lining up to donate blood, throwing a lifeline to countless patients who are in dire need of it. What you won’t see in those queues are gay and bi men, who are banned from giving blood if they’ve had a single sexual encounter in the past three months.

That’s right, if you’re a man who has sex with men and you haven’t been celibate for the past three months then you can’t give blood. Even if you’ve only had sex with one sexual partner in that time, perhaps your boyfriend of three years, or your husband of ten years, then you can’t give blood. 

It wasn’t that long ago that men who have sex with men were permanently banned from giving blood, being lifted in 2011 and replaced with a 12-month exclusion following a review of statistical risk by SaBTO. This meant that gay and bi men weren’t able to give blood if they’d had sex in the past year. 

That came down to the three month period which is now in place back in November 2017. According to the NHS website, this three month period “reflects statistical risks for the sexual behaviour that increases the risk of virus transmission”.

There is a small possibility the tests carried out when the donation is screened doesn’t pick up recently acquired infections, but in the case of HIV, for example, it generally takes just four weeks for HIV to show up in a blood sample. Heterosexual men can have unprotected sex with several partners, going from one ‘one-night stand’ to another, having sex with complete strangers, and still donate blood, while a gay or bisexual man who practises safe sex with a known partner is excluded for a three-month period. 

Though men who have sex with men are of a higher risk of being exposed to sexually transmitted diseases, the blanket ban has been pegged as discriminatory by many activists. In the UK in 2015, 38% of new HIV diagnoses came from heterosexual sexual activity, so why is it only men who have sex with men that aren’t allowed to give blood?

On the NHS’s Give Blood website, it states:

“We do not prevent people from becoming blood donors based on their sexuality. There are some restrictions for blood donors who take part in activities deemed risk behaviours by the Advisory Committee on the Safety of Blood, Tissues and Organs who advise UK ministers and health departments.”

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