MSM Blood Ban Overturned in Brazil
Though Brazil's president, Jair Bolsonaro, proclaims himself to be anti-LGTBQ, and his tenure in office has been marked by anxiety among Brazil's non-heterosexual population, a pinpoint of good news emerged from that nation when Brazil's Supreme Court did away with a yearlong ban on gay and bisexual men giving blood.
The issue had been before Brazil's Supreme Court for since 2016, reports Reuters, and the ruling was finally reached with a majority of seven of the justices out of the 11 justices on the Brazilian Supreme Court bench.
The ban is similar to guidelines that remain in place in other countries, including the U.S., which recently changed its own yearlong ban on blood donations by men who have sex with men (MSM). That revised FDA ban in America declares men ineligible to donate blood or blood products like plasma for a period of three months after having sex with another man.
No such ban exists for heterosexual men, who are free to donate blood even if they are having affairs or visiting prostitutes for sex.
Critics of the American blood ban - and similar bans in other nations - point out the disparity in how non-heterosexual men are treated as compared to straight men, and have blasted the bans as being discriminatory for a seeming implicit assumption that even married gay men are automatically more likely to carry infectious diseases, such as HIV.
The bans were originally enacted during the height of the HIV epidemic, and have remained in place in many places around the world despite advances in testing. Modern tests can detect HIV in donated blood in less than a week after the donor has been exposed to the virus.
All donated blood is screened for pathogens.
Brazil's Supreme Court decision echoed what critics of such bans have said, UK newspaper The Guardian reported, with its decision noting:
"Instead of the state enabling these people to promote good by donating blood, it unduly restricts solidarity based on prejudice and discrimination."
The issue has seen renewed interest after the FDA revised its policy in the face of the COVID-19 epidemic, changing the ban on blood donations from MSM from a full year of celibacy to three months.
Even so, some gay and bisexual men encountered rejection when they volunteered their blood after recovering from the coronavirus. Medical researchers hope that blood plasma containing antibodies to COVID-19 could help severely ill patients. But not all blood collection facilities have caught up to the new guidelines, resulting in men who are now qualified to donate blood being turned away.
The issue also received new interest when one of the men whose offer of donated plasma was rejected turned out to be gay talk show host Andy Cohen, who addressed the issue on his program. Cohen later made an appearance on CBS This Morning to discuss being turned away from the program.
Stated Cohen: "I was told that due to antiquated and discriminatory guidelines from the FDA," Cohen related on his show, "I am ineligible to donate blood because I am a gay man."
More recently, a group of U.S Representatives> - all Democrats - wrote a letter to the head of the FDA, Commissioner Stephen Hahn, to argue against continuing to hold onto the outdated policy.
Wrote the American lawmakers:
"There is no scientific justification for denying MSM who have recovered from coronavirus the opportunity to safely donate plasma. Yet, gay and bisexual men who have recovered from coronavirus and attempted to donate have been turned away in accordance with FDA's blanket deferral recommendation."