According to new Health Canada regulations, transplant programs will no longer be able to harvest organs from the bodies of gay men who were sexually active in the past five years.
Under the new regulations, groups that are at high risk of transmitting infectious diseases including HIV and hepatitis C and B will no longer be accepted as organ donors. The restrictions will also cover intravenous drug users, commercial sex workers and people who have had tattoos or body piercings in the last 12 months using shared needles, came into effect last month.
Numerous gay rights groups and health care experts have criticised the new rules as the Canadian media and various news agencies picked up on the issue this week.
The head of Nova Scotia Rainbow Action Project, a gay advocacy group, was quoted as saying that the new rules which exclude any man who has had sex with a man within five years from organ donation may not only send the wrong the message but leave those preparing for live donation in the lurch.
"They seem to be making decisions that are bad for the health-care system, that don't seem to be designed to meet the real needs of risk management and that send the wrong messages about the gay community and about HIV and AIDS," Kevin Kindred said. "Of course that's frustrating and of course people find that offensive."
Dr. Philip Berger, head of family and community medicine at St. Michael's Hospital, told the Toronto Star that the rules are unfair to thousands of conscientious gays.
"What about a gay monogamous couple, (Health Canada) is not going to let them donate? It's ridiculous," says Berger. "It's been known for 20 years that the risk factor is not in being gay (but) in risky sexual behaviour."
Other medical experts have warned that the new rules could lead to deaths by shrinking an already small pool of donors.
Egale Canada, a gay political lobby organisation, is calling on federal Health Minister Tony Clement to suspend the new policy and for a panel to be appointed to review organ donor rules.
"Health Canada should be making sure the regulations stop unsafe organ transplants and not create a situation where healthy viable gay organs will be thrown away," Helen Kennedy, Egale's executive director, told Reuters.
"It's perpetuating stereotypes. It bans every gay or bisexual man who potentially is in a monogamous relationship - or other gay men who are vigilant about safe sex practices - from donating organs."
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Reader's Comments
I suppose, theoretically, it is possible for someone to donate blood or an organ without knowing he is HIV+ while the test that screened for the virus produced a negative result. It is highly unlikely, but as long as the possibility exists, discrimination against potential gay donors will continue.
I am not surprised that straight lawmakers are so afraid. Since I became HIV+, my rejection rate for sex after I disclose my status is more than 9 out of 10. If my fellow gay brothers who I would expect to be more knowledgeable about HIV are so terrified of me, why would I expect straight people to be any more enlightened?
Have anyone here thought about how they fill about them digging their gloved hands deep into a donar with possible HIV virus. Surgeons who handle scapels all the time. They could easily been infected.
Just also look at it this way, if your brother is doing a transplant for your other brother, and there's two donars, one who's a veteran gay parti animal and the other's a healthy college student, which donar would you prefer to be on the operating. table?
So as it stands if you are determined to give blood and lie about your lifestyle then they will accept your blood donation in Canada. All this does is make me wonder about the blood screening process that they say is so much more effective now. If so, then why the discriminatory policy? This isn't about protecting people from infected blood, this is about protecting the agencies from law suits.
If I were to be in need of some vital organ to continue life, would I care what lifestyle the person had lived that it had come from? So organs from a prostitute are ok but organs from a monogamous gay man are not. Such bullshit.
Seems like the quality of tertiary education's gone down a notch somewhere.
i seriously feel stupid and embarrassed being a canadian.
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