Last week, the NHSBT service changed the guidelines on accepting blood from gay men.
Before now, any male donor who'd had sex with another man in the previous 3 months couldn't give blood.
The claim was that they were a higher risk than heterosexual men but I always felt that they were comparing the wrong groups and should be comparing married V singles.
If you are in a committed, exclusive relationship then your chances of getting STD are zero. but if like Luke, you had a random hook up with a girl you barely knew last week, had a date with someone last night that he met on Grindr and spent the Easter holiday weekend with a couple of sheep in a cottage in Norwich then you are not just linking virally to 3 others but all of their partners as well AND their partners, easily into 7 figures.
so its changed for the better but I'm far from convinced it will lead too a surge in new donations. My friend J, used to give and just lie about his sexuality until he was convinced by others that he shouldn't have to hide it. He says he's not going back until they apologized to him. yeah, well good luck with that
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