Gay and bisexual men should be able to donate blood more easily. Blood Donation SRC Switzerland has developed two proposals for the Swissmedic Institute for Therapeutic Products; full equality is provided for heterosexual persons.
The second “scenario” envisages the rejection of men if they have had same-sex sexual contact in the past four months, blood donation SRK Switzerland announced on Monday. Men are currently only allowed to donate blood if they have not had sex with men in the past 12 months.
Switzerland’s preferred scenario is equality, according to the announcement. It only provides for rejection if a person has had sex with a new person in the last four months prior to the donation or has had sex with more than two people in the last 12 months. The same goes for heterosexual people.
With the new guidelines, Blutspendende SRK Schweiz wants to reduce discrimination against gay men on the one hand and take health developments into account on the other. Thanks to more HIV testing among men who have sex with men (MSM), the number of undiagnosed HIV infections is declining. Experiences in several Western countries following the relaxation of MSM donation criteria under the two proposed scenarios also showed continued low transmission risks.
The Swiss licensing and supervisory authority for medicines and medical devices, Swissmedic, will decide whether to relax the guidelines. According to Swissmedic, blood donation SRC Switzerland on Monday presented the results of the evaluation of the two scenarios to assess their admissibility.
Until 2017, men who have sex with men were not allowed to donate blood. The gay organizations Pink Cross and Network, as well as the Swiss AIDS Federation, welcomed a further lowering of blood donation barriers for MSM in a joint statement on Monday. The organizations are clearly in favor of the variant with absolute equality. The specification of a four-month abstention would also be “unnecessary discrimination,” the statement said.
(sda)
Source: Blick
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