The gay Vampire

     This post may be entitled “the gay vampire” but in no way am I referring to Twilight, or is it a humorous essay. On the contrary it’s very serious and about the subject of blood donations. 

    We learn something new every day. I’m the kind of guy who’s always in a perpetual quest for knowledge and who likes to stay up to date especially in my field of studies. However I have to say I have missed a big issue: it all started one week ago, when I participated in the Blood drive organized by “Donner sans compter”,  a Lebanese organization that supplies the Red Cross and hospitals with blood, kind of a blood bank. 

    Among the activities and games, there was an awareness campaign and one statement shocked me: gay men are not allowed to donate blood.  Apparently they are in the high risk category among sex workers and drug addicts. This was a law that started in the late 1960 after the HIV outburst, but continued to live to our day. Isn’t it a bit outdated?

      I did my research, thinking it was just the Lebanese retarded mentality but was astonished to actually find that it’s a worldwide problem.  The purpose of this law is to limit the propagation of the HIV virus, many organization tried to abolish such discrimination but the best they were able to do is modify the law as follows: a gay man can donate blood if he didn’t have intercourse with another man for more than one year. 

      In my opinion it’s bogus because any man in a monogamous relation or active cannot fall in that category. So really it’s useless, you may as well watch your loved one die in front of your very eyes if they have a rare blood type and you are the only one that can donate because the hospital will never allow it.

     For me, many straight couples have anal sex and don’t use condoms. Aren’t they at risk (equal risk that is) than a gay couple?

The law should be simple, implying that only monogamous couples that use protection are able to donate whereas others cannot.

    When filling the papers to become a donor, I’m sure many gay men lied when asked if they had intercourse with people of the same sex and eventually became life time donors.  All blood is tested for HIV and all STDs before a transfusion so really no one is at risk especially that detection methods have become quicker and more efficient. 

     I think in the blood donating case, same rights should apply to gay and straight men as long as they use protection. A prostitute can lie and she puts people at risk by giving her blood, if an honest gay man is tested and clean he cannot give his blood?!

    Isn’t saving a life the ultimate purpose, isn’t a donor supposed to be a responsible and caring person. If these conditions apply and the original blood tests are clean before becoming a frequent donor then what’s the hold back?