ARLINGTON, Va., Nov. 14 (UPI) -- An FDA advisory panel overwhelmingly voted to recommend lifting a lifetime ban on blood donations from gay men.
For 31 years, gay and bisexual men -- or any man who has had sex with another man since 1977 -- have been subject to a lifetime ban on donating blood over fears of the spread of the HIV virus. While all donated blood is tested, HIV cannot be detected by current tests for 11 days after the virus is contracted.
"HIV tests currently in use are highly accurate, but still cannot detect HIV 100 percent of the time," the FDA says on its website. "It is estimated that the HIV risk from a unit of blood has been reduced to about one per 2 million in the USA, almost exclusively from so-called 'window' period donations."
But critics of the ban say it propagates a false stigma of gay men having HIV, the American Red Cross, American Medical Association and the American Association of Blood Banks have all said the ban was medically and scientifically unnecessary.
On Thursday, U.S. Advisory Committee on Blood and Tissue Safety and Ability, a panel of advisers to the Department of Health and Human Services, recommended the policy be changed to a one-year deferral, meaning men who have had sex with men should be able to donate blood after remaining abstinent for one year.
The 16-2 recommendation will be considered by the Blood Products Advisory Committee when it meets Dec. 2, which will then make a recommendation to the FDA. The United Kingdom, Australia and Canada all have one- to five-year deferrals policies in place.
Some advocates, including the National Gay Blood Drive, cheered the move as a "huge step in the right direction."
"The FDA has repeatedly said that they are open to changing the policy, but have been awaiting the results of the HHS studies that were presented today," NGBD said. "While today was a big success, there is still a long road ahead. We must continue to increase pressure on HHS and FDA until discrimination based on sexual orientation is eliminated from the blood donation process altogether."
But others, including the Human Rights Council, said that the recommendation still leaves in place a policy that discriminates without scientific justification.
"This recommendation -- although nominally better than the existing policy -- falls far short because it continues to stigmatize gay and bisexual men, preventing them from donating life-saving blood based solely on their sexual orientation," said David Stacy, HRC's government affairs director.
"The current policy, adopted in the earliest days of the HIV/AIDS epidemic, and the new recommendation are both simply wrong and can no longer be justified in light of scientific research and updated blood screening technology. It's far past time for this stigma to end."
According to AIDS.gov, at least 1.1 million people in the U.S. are living with HIV, but an estimated 16 percent of those people don't know they have the virus.
Of the approximately 50,000 new HIV infections each year, about 28,500 of them are among men who have sex with men.
