No more discrimination when donating blood

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The National Council approved the bill on Wednesday with 181 votes to 0. The case now goes to the Council of States.

The rule changes for blood donations were initiated in 2016 by former Aargau SVP Landsraadslide Ulrich Giezendanner (69). He demanded that the blood supply of the population be made a federal task.

To this day, the blood donation service has not been expressly recognized by the legislature as a public service, nor is there an executive mandate between the federal government and the blood donation service. Voluntary and unpaid blood donation is recognized as a fundamental ethical principle in several recommendations and guidelines from the World Health Organization and the Council of Europe, but has not yet been implemented at the legislative level.

No more discrimination

That should now change. The amendment to the Medicines Act enshrines the principle of free blood donation in the law. The financing of the blood donation system should remain a private task and be done through the cost-covering sale of the blood products.

A minority of the SP, Mitte and GLP in the National Council wanted to allow the introduction of financial aid to supply the population with sufficient blood. However, the plenary meeting followed the Federal Council, which advised against it – including the reference that the cantons are in principle responsible for health care.

In addition to the original text of the initiative, the Grand Chamber has enshrined in the Medicines Act that no one may be discriminated against when donating blood. In the future, any form of discrimination, for example on the basis of sexual orientation, will be prohibited in the exclusion criteria for donating blood. Rather, the criteria for not allowing someone to donate should be based on individual risk behavior and science.

Swissmedic decides to relax the guidelines

The background is that after the outbreak of the AIDS epidemic from 1988 to 2017, gay and bisexual men were generally excluded from donating blood – regardless of their personal life situation and behavior. Men are currently only allowed to donate blood if they have not had sex with men in the past 12 months.

Blood donation SRC Switzerland developed two new solutions at the end of last year. One provides full equality to heterosexual people. The second scenario involves men being rejected if they have had same-sex sexual contact in the past four months. The pharmaceutical authority Swissmedic decides whether the guidelines will be relaxed.

Numerous European countries have lifted restrictions on homosexual blood donors in recent years. In 2017, the Council of States ruled against relaxing the rules.

Despite seasonal fluctuations, the supply of blood products to Switzerland was always guaranteed last year. 265,223 blood donations were collected. According to Blood Donation SRC Switzerland, the number of blood donations fell by about one percent from the previous year.

(SDA)

Source:Blick