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Jewish World Review Sept. 18, 2000/ 17 Elul, 5760

Wesley Pruden

Wes Pruden
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Consumer Reports


Playing politics with
the blood supply


http://www.jewishworldreview.com -- LET'S SEE if we've got this straight:

An advisory committee to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration actually considered whether to change federal regulations to allow homosexual and bisexual men to donate blood to blood banks, even though homosexual and bisexual men make up the majority of Americans infected with HIV, the virus which causes AIDS. Italics definitely mine.

Sanity prevailed on the committee, but only by a single vote. There's no medical reason to make such a radical and medically risky change, since there's no shortage of blood acute enough to justify the increased risk of spreading AIDS.

But election-year politics is at stake, and the FDA, an agency presided over by Welfare Secretary Donna Shalala, still must make a final decision.

Gay-pride activists argue that to continue the current practice of shunning blood suspected of HIV-contamination "discriminates" against homosexual and bisexual men. The American Red Cross, which collects more blood than any other organization, thinks such a change would be looney, though Red Cross spokesmen naturally wouldn't say it quite that way.

Since the feelings of some homosexuals are hurt, it's better, or at least more politic in the current climate, to risk spreading AIDS to innocent men, women and children — and to uninfected homosexual men — than to risk hurting the feelings of an important Democratic constituency.

Homosexual men are not the only prospective donors who are prohibited from giving (or selling) blood. Druggies who pop an intravenous fix, and even those who used to do that but no longer do, are shunned, too. So are hemophiliacs who have used clotting concentrates made from blood. So is anyone who has lived in or visited anyone in Nigeria, Cameroon and six other sub-Saharan African nations. But nobody has so far suggested relaxing the ban on their blood. We may have a serious civil-rights violation here. Hate crime, anyone?

The blood banks promise to take certain precautions, of course. Such homosexual donors would have to say they have not had sexual relations with other men for at least a year, and since everyone knows that nobody ever lies about sex, that presumably should satisfy the FDA and the blood banks.

"We think this is fair, since there are new tests that detect infectious diseases earlier," says a spokesman for the blood banks. One test in routine use at blood banks today can detect the presence of HIV 16 days after infection. Another test already in use at some blood banks can detect HIV's genetic material 8 to 12 days after infection. "Our highest priority is to enhance the safety and availability of blood," she says. "We believe this change would not compromise that." Well, not unless you're luckless enough to get the blood of an infected homosexual who donated blood within that 8-, 12- or 16-day window before the tests could detect it. If that happens, well, shut up and remember that life is unfair.

Many doctors, who have responsibilities to specific patients, don't trust the blood supply now. You could ask a candidate for surgery who has been urged to stockpile his or her own blood in advance of the cut.

"Some of the questions they ask are fairly blunt," one such surgical candidate says. "What kind of sexual activity I've had in the past few months, even whether I had sold or bought sex. I felt sorry for the nurse asking me the questions, having to treat me as if I might have been a part-time hooker."

Mark Leno, a county supervisor in San Francisco, complains that the current policy of caution is bad because it focuses on homosexual men, who are most likely to be infected with HIV, and doesn't take into account heterosexuals, who are not likely to be infected with HIV.

"There continues to be a lot of misunderstanding and concern on the public's part," he told the San Francisco Chronicle. "The safety of the public blood supply is extremely important." Just not as important as the self-esteem of his constituents.

Mr. Leno is wrong. There's very little misunderstanding on the public's part. The public, despite the earnest exertions and exhortations of the homosexual lobby and its eager sopranos and contraltos in the media chorus, understand that AIDS is almost altogether a disease of homosexuals and druggies, and most of the so-called heterosexual-AIDS sufferers are women who, for miserable reasons of their own, live with infected druggies and are on the receiving end of love where most of us sit down. Two decades of frantic propaganda to persuade everyone otherwise has not worked, and won't work, because the hard facts speak in such loud, clear voice.


JWR contributor Wesley Pruden is editor in chief of The Washington Times. Comment by clicking here.

Up

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06/28/00: Bureaucracy amok! Punctuation in peril!
06/26/00: The water torture of American resolve
06/21/00: The happy hangman is a busy hangman
06/19/00: Dick Gephardt finds a Dixie dreamboat
06/14/00: Taking a byte out of innovation
06/12/00: 'Go away, little boy, you're bothering us'
06/07/00: When a little envy is painful to watch
06/05/00: Fire and thunder, bubble and squeak
05/31/00: South of the border, politics is pepper
05/26/00: Running out of luck with home folks
05/24/00: The heart says no, but the head says yes
05/22/00: A fine opportunity to set an example
05/17/00: The Sunday school for Republicans
05/15/00: Hillary's surrogate for telling tall tales
05/10/00: Listening to the voice of an authentic man
05/08/00: First a lot of bluster, then the retreat
05/02/00: Good news for Rudy, bad news for Hillary
04/28/00: The long goodbye to Elian's boyhood
04/25/00: Spooked by Castro, Bubba blinks
04/14/00: One flag down and two memorials to go
04/11/00: Consistency finds a jewel in Janet Reno
04/07/00: Here's the good word (and it's in English)
04/04/00: When bureaucrats mock the courts
03/28/00: How Hollywood sets the virtual table
03/24/00: Dissing a president can ruin a whole day
03/20/00: When shame begets the painful insult
03/14/00: The risky business of making an apology
03/10/00: The pouters bugging a weary John McCain
03/07/00: When all good things (sob) come to an end

© 2000 Wes Pruden