Can gay men give blood or not?

[dsc]

My school is having a blood drive and I would like to give if I can. The last I heard they had voted to let people who had refrained from sex for a year give. Is that the case? I have looked online and have gotten conflicting answers.

[rocktivity]

1. FDA Lifting Ban On Some Gay Blood Donors

YourHHRS News.com: The Food and Drug Administration announced Tuesday that it would scrap a decades-old lifetime prohibition on blood donation by gay and bisexual men...lifting the lifetime ban but keeping in place a block on donations by men who have had sex with other men in the last 12 months…

“This is a major victory for gay civil rights,” said I. Glenn Cohen, a law professor at Harvard who specializes in bioethics and health. “We’re leaving behind the old view that every gay man is a potential infection source.” He said, however, that the policy was “still not rational enough.”

...GMHC, the advocacy group formerly known as Gay Men’s Health Crisis, called the new policy “offensive and harmful.” AIDS United, a Washington-based lobbying group, said that it was a “step forward,” but that it “continues to perpetuate discrimination against gay and bisexual men.”

More

rocktivity

[dsc]

3. that is what I thought

but the red cross website doesn't agree with that.

[Agschmid]

2. We can give it, they may not use it for donor purposes.

At least that's what I was told.

[marym625]

4. and yet

The largest group of growing HIV infected people are drug users.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2015/02/25/hiv-cases-indiana-linked-prescription-drug-abuse/24024263/

Officials said this is the largest HIV outbreak the state has ever experienced in one region.

I hate this rule. It disgusts me.

[gvstn]

5. New rules aren't in effect yet.

Marks said the FDA planned to issue draft guidance on the matter early in 2015, invite public comment for several months and issue a final rule “as expeditiously as possible.”

“This won’t be an immediate change,” he cautioned.

http://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-gay-blood-donors-20141223-story.html#page=1

[PeaceNikki]

6. This ^

[dsc]

8. thanks

I thought it was a done deal but apparently was wrong.

[KamaAina]

7. When that rule first came out

lesbians rolled up their sleeves in an attempt to replace every single pint their gay brothers could not donate.

[cwydro]

9. I remember that.

The Red Cross actually came into our bars in Key West to ask us to donate.