Senators: Lift ban on gay blood donors

A group of Democratic senators is asking the FDA to lift the ban on gay men donating blood.

Led by Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.), the lawmakers wrote a letter to FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg on Thursday calling the ban discriminatory and unwarranted.

The rule was put in place in 1983 to prevent HIV-tained blood from entering the nation's blood supply. The senators argued Thursday that modern HIV tests have made a blanket ban on gay donors unnecessary.

"We live in a very different country than we did in 1983," they wrote. "Today, the high-risk behaviors associated with HIV contraction are more fully understood and dramatic technological improvements have been made in HIV detection."

Moreover, the senators argue that the rule is plainly discriminatory, since heterosexual donors who have engaged in risky sexual behavior aren't as strictly screened.

"[P]rospective donors who have engaged in heterosexual sexual activity with a person known to have HIV are deferred for one year. At the same time, male donors who engaged in protected homosexual sexual activity with a monogamous partner 26 years ago are deferred for life," they wrote.

A group of 11 House Democrats, led by Rep. Mike Quigley (D-Ill.), petitioned the FDA in December to drop the ban..

Kerry led a successful effort earlier this year to lift a travel ban on HIV-positive individuals entering the United States.

Besides Kerry, the following senators signed today's letter: Kirstin Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), Daniel Akaka (D-Hawaii), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.), Bob Casey (D-Pa.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Russ Feingold (D-Wis.), Mark Udall (D-Colo.), Al Franken (D-Minn.), Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.), Carl Levin (D-Mich.), Tom Harkin (D-Ohio), Mark Begich (D-Alaska), Roland Burris (D-Ill.) and Michael Bennet (D-Colo.).