(Gabriella Angotti-Jones / Los Angeles Times) What the new study aims to find out is whether it would be equally effective to assess risk with specific questions about risk behavior, such as how many sexual partners someone has had recently.ĭonations at a blood drive in downtown Los Angeles in 2020. “Because testing isn’t perfect, we want to preselect donors who have the lowest risks,” said Stramer, one of the lead researchers on the Advance Study. Susan Stramer, vice president of scientific affairs for the American Red Cross, said that the Red Cross and other blood banks are interested in reassessing the rules to ensure that “anyone who has an appropriate safety profile can donate.” Now blood banks are seeking out gay and bisexual men in cities including Los Angeles, Miami and Memphis for the Advance Study, which aims to find out whether asking would-be donors about risky behaviors - such as having sex without a condom - could be a safe alternative to screening out all men who have recently had sex with men. When the FDA sought comments, hundreds of people sent in letters asserting that “weakening the protections of America’s blood supply for political ideology puts the safety of Americans at risk.” Others have argued against loosening the restrictions, saying it is too risky to expand eligibility among a group that has higher rates of HIV infection.
Gay men in monogamous relationships are generally barred, but “what about straight men who are having unprotected sex with women or engaging in other risky behavior?” “It’s perpetuating a discriminatory approach that’s not based in science,” said Stephen Lee, executive director of the National Alliance of State and Territorial AIDS Directors. Many were especially upset after a mass shooting at the gay nightclub Pulse in Orlando, Fla., when gay men were turned away from giving blood to help the wounded. The federal rules have long drawn protests from physicians, politicians and activists who denounce them as outdated and stigmatizing. But gay and bisexual men are still ineligible to donate if they have had sex with another man in the last three months. The FDA, which regulates blood banks, has eased the rules somewhat in recent years. Decades ago, as AIDS began devastating gay communities, the Food and Drug Administration advised blood centers to prohibit any man who had had sex with another man since 1977 - even once - from donating. Men who have sex with men have long faced restrictions on giving blood in the United States, amid concerns about the disproportionate toll of HIV/AIDS on gay and bisexual men. “It’s frustrating not being able to help when I’m a healthy donor,” said Goldstein, a biology professor who has been in a monogamous relationship with his husband for more than a decade. Now the 38-year-old was in a donation center for the first time in years, this time as part of a study that could lead to the changing of a federal rule that has angered and alienated gay men such as him. He used to routinely give blood when he was much younger, eager to help save a life. Andrew Goldstein sat and waited as his blood, precious and disputed, flowed into the vials.