By Cara Murez and Robin Foster
HealthDay Reporters
THURSDAY, Dec. 1, 2022 (HealthDay Information) – U.S. Meals & Drug Administration insurance policies which have restricted blood donations from males who’ve intercourse with males might quickly ease.
For the time being, FDA coverage doesn’t permit blood donation from males who’ve had intercourse with different males previously three months. That is already a shorter timeframe than previously, when the company required a one-year hole.
The company is now contemplating switching to questionnaires that target particular person threat, relatively than blanket limitations, CNN reported.
“The FDA stays dedicated to gathering the scientific information associated to various donor deferral insurance policies that preserve a excessive stage of blood security,” the company stated in a press release issued Wednesday. “We anticipate issuing up to date draft steerage within the coming months.”
Info collected by a donor eligibility questionnaire and blood surveillance “will seemingly help a coverage transition to particular person risk-based donor screening questions for decreasing the danger of HIV transmission,” the company added, CNN reported.
The FDA modified these tips in 2020 as the necessity for blood donations grew in the course of the pandemic, CNN reported.
“Whereas as we speak’s studies of an overdue transfer from the FDA is a crucial step, our neighborhood and main medical consultants won’t cease advocating for the FDA to carry all restrictions towards certified LGBTQ blood donor candidates,” Sarah Kate Ellis, CEO and president of GLAAD, an LGBTQ media advocacy group, stated in a press release.
Different nations have already made related strikes: Since 2020, males in a long-term relationship with one other man have been allowed to donate blood in the UK, although different males who’ve intercourse with males should nonetheless wait to donate for 3 months.
A Wall Avenue Journal report on Wednesday cited sources acquainted with the FDA plan, saying that males who’re in monogamous relationships with different males could be allowed to donate blood. Those that have had a brand new sexual associate and have had anal intercourse previously three months wouldn’t be allowed to make a donation, CNN reported.
“As LGBTQ leaders and medical consultants have been saying for years: bans and restrictions on blood donations from homosexual and bisexual males are rooted in stigma, not science,” Ellis stated.
Medical and blood donation organizations voiced their help of the plan.
“The AMA [American Medical Association] relentlessly advocates for eliminating public insurance policies that don’t align with scientific proof and finest moral practices, which is why we’ve urged the FDA to make use of rational, scientifically-based deferral durations for donation of blood, corneas and different tissues which are pretty and constantly utilized to donors based on their particular person threat,” AMA President Dr. Jack Resneck Jr. instructed CNN.
The American Pink Cross stated Wednesday it “believes blood donation eligibility shouldn’t be decided by strategies which are based mostly upon sexual orientation and is dedicated to working with companions towards attaining this objective.”
The Pink Cross added that it has been concerned within the FDA-funded ADVANCE research to find out whether or not a questionnaire that assessed particular person dangers in homosexual and bisexual donors may exchange a blanket time-based coverage.
Extra info
The U.S. Division of Well being and Human Companies has extra on donating blood.
SOURCE: CNN; statements, Nov 30, 2022, GLAAD, American Pink Cross
