Gay men as well as men who have sex with men would be able to donate “whole blood” under certain circumstances in a major policy change being proposed by the Australian Red Cross Lifeblood service.
Lifeblood chief executive officer Stephen Cornelissen said that while current gender-based sexual activity rules for blood collection were “necessary to ensure a safe blood supply in the past”, they had “contributed to the stigma faced by gay and bisexual men in Australia”.
Cornelissen’s comments were published on Tuesday in an opinion article for Australian LGBTI+ magazine and news website Star Observer.
The comments coincided with an update to the Lifeblood website, which detailed the proposed change to whole blood collection.
Cornelissen said the proposed change will be submitted for approval to the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) in 2024.
The change would introduce “individual risk assessments” for whole blood donation, in which gay and bisexual men having sex with only one partner in the three months prior would become eligible to donate.
The proposed change comes after the TGA approved a separate proposal by Lifeblood in May this year that will allow everyone, regardless of their sexual activity, to donate plasma (a liquid component of blood) without any wait period.
This includes gay and bisexual men, anyone taking PrEP medication to prevent HIV, and those with a new partner or multiple partners.
Lifeblood says it is working on a timeline to start these plasma collections in 2024. Plasma is described as a “golden” component of blood used for the treatment of cancer, immune disorders, haemophilia, trauma, and kidney disease.
Currently, people cannot donate whole blood for 12 months after they last took PrEP, or 3 months for plasma. If they are not taking PrEP, gay and bisexual men must abstain from sex for three months before donating whole blood.
Those donating plasma under the approved change must still meet all other eligibility rules, which include questions about a donor’s age, whether they’re low in iron, if they’ve had a tattoo in the past 4 months at an unlicensed tattoo parlour, whether they’ve recently given birth, and if they have a heart condition.
Dr Sharon Dane of the Let Us Give campaign welcomed the proposed change to whole blood collection.
“We have repeatedly said the supply of safe blood would be optimised if gay and bi men and trans women are able to donate whole blood under an individual risk assessment regime, as well as being able to donate plasma,” Dane said.
“Lifeblood’s previous preference of only allowing plasma donation would have replaced an old form of discrimination with a new form, effectively making gay and bisexual men and trans women second-tier donors.
“This is a small but significant step towards the kind of blood equality thousands of gay, bi and trans Australians have been seeking for years.”
Lifeblood’s Cornelissen said the previously approved change for plasma collection “means Australia would be the first country in the world to remove wait times for plasma donation for gay and bisexual men taking PrEP or having anal sex with new or multiple sexual partners”.
Australia would also be the first to have individual risk assessments for blood donation, Cornelissen said, under which gay and bisexual men having sex with only one partner in the three months prior would become eligible to donate blood.
Cornelissen’s opinion article did not make mention of trans people and their current donation restrictions.
However, the update to the Lifeblood website says a “gender-neutral approach” will be part of its proposed individual risk assessment change for blood donation. Currently, if a trans person has had sex with a male or transgender partner in the last 3 months, they need to wait 3 months from contact before they can donate.
“Your biology can also affect the patient,” the Lifeblood website tells trans people.
“For instance, we can’t use platelets from female donors because of the increased risk of a rare but dangerous reaction called transfusion-related acute lung injury (TRALI) that’s associated with antibodies in plasma.
“The restriction also applies to trans male donors as well as trans female donors, who are affected by fail-safe mechanisms built in to Lifeblood’s blood management system.
“Note that this restriction only affects platelet donation – female and transgender donors can still give plasma and whole blood donations.”
There are also other important biological differences that affect blood donation that are listed on the Lifeblood website, many of them related to a donor’s welfare.
Gay Sydney News reporter
Gay Sydney News editor