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CAMPAIGNERS HAVE THIS week criticised the need to import blood from Britain without addressing restrictions on Irish gay and bisexual men from donating blood.
On Wednesday the Irish Blood Transfusion Service (IBTS) announced it was importing a bulk consignment of blood from the UK for the first time since the late 1990s due to a current shortage in supply.
115 units of Rh negative blood groups – O negative, A negative and B negative – were collected from the NHS Blood and Transplant in Manchester on Friday.
The IBTS has not imported blood in bulk since the late 1990s. The IBTS does occasionally import a small number of rare blood units, however.
Ireland imposes harsher restrictions on gay & bi men who wish to donate blood than most other European countries.
— NXF (@nxfie) June 30, 2021
We repeat our call for blood donation to be based solely on individual behaviours, not gender/sexuality. #blood #BloodBan @Giveblood_ie @roinnslainte #Pride https://t.co/SWSh12PwOO
A campaigner and two groups representing gay men and men who have sex with men have criticised the importation. They said that while gay men can donate blood in the UK, the IBTS has certain restrictions.
The IBTS formerly had a lifelong deferral for men who have sex with men (MSM), but this was changed to a one-year deferral in the last five years.
This means that a man whose last sexual contact with another man was more than 12 months ago will be eligible to donate if he meets the other donor selection criteria.
Tomás Heneghan, who took a High Court action to compel the Government to change the restriction, said that it was “incredibly frustrating” to watch the issue play out.
“I would imagine at least some of what is coming in would be from men who are taking up the opportunity for the first time. I think it is very likely to be blood from gay men.
“I am incredibly frustrated watching this play out. They have made a change in Britain and also in the North,” he said.
Tomás believes that the cause of the Irish restrictions is an institutional fear of an unforeseen problem.
“There is no science to the Irish situation, no rationality to it, it doesn’t make any sense.
“I have asked myself the question why for many, many years and I have asked the blood service and other people and I have never got a satisfactory answer to it. My suspicions are a number of factors especially institutional fear what happened in the 80s and 90s with blood transfusion scandals.
“The two things do not connect, the institutional fear is that it could happen again. I understand that the 80s and 90s scandals were more about other types of donors in the US.
“They have a fear of getting sued again by numerous plaintiffs,” he explained.
Caution
Bill Foley, the secretary of the Gay Health Network, supported Tomás’ view that risk aversion was a cause of the IBTS stance.
“It is down to an abundance of caution,” he said.
“Covid is a good example of how medics approach risk. In Ireland there has been a very cautious approach.
“In terms of HIV there are specific modes of transmissions, people can identify if they were at risk. A blanket ban is discriminating in itself and should be re-examined,” he said.
The IBTS has said that there is a serious shortage of blood in Ireland due to the pandemic.
It said that a full risk assessment was carried out before importing the blood from the UK and said there was only “a remote risk” of transmitting an infection by transfusing imported blood.
Asked about donor risk, the IBTS said:
“The NHSBT has recently changed the way it assesses donor risk. The IBTS is currently undertaking a social behaviours review looking at our existing deferral practice across a number of areas, including MSM.
“That process is on-going and we hope to have it concluded in the autumn. When we have recommendations to make to the IBTS Board on these risks we will do so and the decision will be made public.”
The Department of Health also said in a statement that the IBTS “blood safety standards set down in EU Blood Directives, this decision poses no risk to the national blood supply”.
“The Department is satisfied that this action [of importing blood] was necessary to supplement the blood supply while the IBTS undertake measures to increase attendance for appointments at blood donation clinics.
“The action taken will mitigate the potential impact of low supplies of Rhesus Negative blood on patient care,” the Department said.
The National LGBT Federation did not respond to a request for comment.
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12 months is an insult. There are rapid HIV and std testing that can give clear results in hours now.
@Joey:
Those rapid HIV tests are not 100% accurate. They test everything, but there’s always a chance of something getting through. We’re talking about an extremely dangerous viral disease, so I’m glad they’re minimising the risks.
It’s not an insult, it’s a decision they made based on Bayesian statistics. Do you think they’re refusing blood out of some political agenda?
@David Bourke: do you think straight people can’t get HIV?
@David Bourke: what are the statistical chances of a rapid test going a false negative, verses the chances of a straight person having HIV and not being tested at all?
@Steve Mac:
I know for a fact that they can, but I also know for a fact that gay men are the most likely to contract the disease: https://www.irishtimes.com/news/health/gay-and-bisexual-men-most-likely-to-contract-hiv-in-ireland-1.1614273
I’m not trying to insult people here, or make any judgements, it’s an unfortunate reality. But why are people so emotional about this? We’re talking about reducing the likelihood of contracting a very serious disease, it’s too dangerous to base decisions on politics.
I know it might be hurtful to some, but the fact is that the majority of HIV cases Ireland are the result of male-to-male sex. That makes them a high risk group, and so people have made the decision that the risk is too high.
@:
Straight people are tested the same way gay people are when they donate blood, so I don’t see the point of your question.
My point is that HIV tests are not 100% accurate, so it’s completely sensible to take additional precautions. This is not about moral judgements or discrimination, it’s just a risk assessment.
@David Bourke: I would consider a gay man in a long term monogamous relationship much lower risk than a straight man who sleeps around. Btw the headline is wrong in that 8 year old article. 82 out of 165 is not a majority. 83 cases were not gay men.
The article also states that gay men are more likely to get tested regularly which lowers the risk again.
@Steve Mac:
It’s an old article, this one is more recent: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/25/world/europe/ireland-hiv-infection.html
“In 2017, only 5 percent of the new H.I.V. diagnoses were found to have been transmitted via infected needles, while 53 percent were attributable to sex between men, according to health officials.”
As for what you consider higher risk, you know that you can’t actually give blood if you’ve been sleeping around recently, right? The questionnaire has plenty of questions that filter out many heterosexual people too.
As for a gay man in a long term relationship, there’s always a chance of the partner cheating and sleeping around. And unfortunately, men in that demographic are high risk.
This isn’t about moral judgements or right vs wrong, it’s purely about the likelihood a person has HIV.
@David Bourke: most HIV cases are through a person receiving rather than giving, bottom men are more likely to become infected than top men
@David Bourke: there’s nothing stopping you from giving blood if you’ve been sleeping around, unless you’re sleeping with prostitutes or drug addicts.
@David Bourke: So why do promiscuous, unsafe heteros have carte blanche on this. It is based on deeply inbedded, and sometimes unconscious bigotry. All donors should be questioned on their sexual practices. Too often in college did I hear boasting about the sexual escapades of my hetero pals. No condoms, ah shur I know, but you know urself… No, I don’t know myself. I always use condoms. So these lads can give blood, but me, for whom sex was like a flight safety check in my college days, was banned. It made no sense then and it makes no sense now.
@David Bourke: And sadly you have men who engage in the odd encounter of the same kind but identify themselves as hetero. This group is very dangerous as they statistically tend to be unsafe because their behaviour involves profound compartmentalisation. Your regular out and about gay guy is usually more open about sexual.practoces et Al. I’d rather have blood from gay as a Christmas tree Joe, who has no reason to lie than from ultra hetero Paddy who sneaks in the side door of the Boiler House Sauna under the cover of dark.
I’m donating again Monday. Called them up and they got me a slot instantly. If you can donate please ring. They have space. Its also madness not to take gay mens blood and that should ve changed as soon as possible if not instantly. For those who can/are allowed to donate please do.
Do they not test each donation so if there is anything less than ideal they can just destroy said donation and make the donor aware? Or am i missing something here?
@Mary OGorman McGuire:
Tests are not 100% accurate, so it’s an additional precaution to reduce the likelihood of contaminated blood being used in transfusion.
@David Bourke: there’s a reason other countries have abandoned this logic
Almost nothing in science is 100% but we treat them as though they are. Look up ISO definitions of things like “sterile” environments, or the food regulatory definitions of things like “zero calories”.
Negligible is invariably accepted as good enough because, with a few exceptions like mathematics, it’s the best we can get.
@Gerard:
Firstly, Ireland’s position is not as rare as you think. The UK has the same deferral policy, but with 3 months instead of 12 months. Australia has also lowered theirs from 12 months to 3 months. But this policy is quite common around the world.
In China, Greece, and the Philipenes it’s a permanent deferral. This is a well known and accepted issue with blood donations.
Uhhhh no we don’t treat tests “as if they were 100%”, we use Bayesian statistics to combine experimental data with historic data to produce a more accurate prediction.
We know there’s a likelihood of false negatives from these tests, and the experts have decided that this risk is unacceptable for them. For that reason, the pre-filter people to reduce the risk of infected blood being transfused. What’s so difficult to understand?
In your own words, why do you think the IBTS has this policy? Do you think you know better than they do what risks are appropriate?
I really think this issue should be left to the experts in that field. Politicising issues like this does nobody any good. Franky, I fear that countries are adjusting their positions to satisfy a bizarre political agenda.
@David Bourke: the UK recently joined Argentina, Italy, Russia, South Africa, Spain, Hungary and other countries that do not restrict gay men from donating but instead adopt an individualised risk based approach for everyone. The evolution to these policies was based on science and the fact that there was no significant increase in the prevalence of hiv from blood donations from gay men.
@Robert McConkey:
Rob, read the NHS website, there is a 3 month deferral, the same kind of process Ireland, has, only in Ireland it’s 12 months.
You’re misrepresenting things.
@David Bourke: I don’t think you have checked recently. The NHS restriction is anyone who has had an al sex with a new partner or multiple partners in the last 3 months. You or your partner’s gender doesn’t come in to it.
https://www.blood.co.uk/who-can-give-blood/can-i-give-blood/
@David Bourke: David, I have not misrepresented anything, your information is not current. https://www.npr.org/2021/06/16/1007006637/gay-and-bisexual-men-are-now-allowed-to-donate-blood-in-england-scotland-and-wal?t=1625410486708
“… Donor eligibility will now be based on each person’s individual circumstances surrounding health, travel and sexual behaviors regardless of gender, according to the NHS. Potential donors will no longer be asked if they are a man who has had sex with another man, but they will be asked about recent sexual activity…. “
@Dan Morgan: why does it specify an al though? Genuinely wondering.
Outrageous. Shame on the Blood Bank.
There’s plenty of demographic profiling you could do for calculated risk management. But there’s only a very small number the IBTS actually does.
Modern tests are EXTREMELY accurate — nothing in science is 100% ever, certainly not in medicine.
The idea that the IBTS just follows science is demonstrably false. The previous policy for many years was a lifetime ban, while intravenous drug users were only deferred for a year. It’s just like refusing to recognise ANY validity of antigen covid tests in Ireland — what is it that we “know” that all the other countries don’t?
Moreover, no one seems to be batting an eye at the idea of importing from the UK, which already has relaxed this. So what’s the difference?
They don’t take the blood of donors that have been hospitalised for Covid-19 no matter how long ago and fully recovered. This might contribute to the current situation that they need to buy blood from the UK.
I am wondering if the UK blood has been taken under the same restrictions or if they actually bought blood from recovered Covid-19 patients.
Are they still banning blood from people who lived in UK in the 80s?
@Bunny Johnson: this was the reason I was unable to donated. As far as I know I think that it has been lifted.
@Bunny Johnson: No that’s changed
If I needed blood I wouldn’t care where it came from as long as it’s screened and clean
So as it currently stands, I am banned from donating here in Ireland, but I could go to the UK, even over the border on our own island, make a donation, and its theoretically possible that the ITBS could import my blood and use it here. Why not fix the lunacy and amend the rules to an individualised risk assessed approach so I can just donate here?
Only recently started accepting individuals who have hemachromatosis of which there are many. I went from being persona no grata to be called regularly to give blood. Times change and where’s there’s a will there’s a way.
I still can’t donate because I lived in the uk for 12 months in the 90s .. which strikes me as a bit odd .. ( to do with bse and nv cjd )
It’s not just Gay Men. Since I lived in Canada and the UK when younger I am prohibited from donating as I ate red meat in both locations and could be a BSE carrier. A stupid policy. Where are the tens if thousands of BSE cases promised by scientists in the 80s . This post is getting a 6/10 toxic rating, I totally puzzled why
@Gregory Pym: B S E is being flagged as short for bull s^*t lol my comment is also toxic lol
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