Dear gair rhydd,
It is a very dangerous and selfish idea to think students should boycott blood transfusion services.
Students are, for the most part, fit, healthy, not on long-term medication and have a bit of spare time to give. They are the perfect candidates to be blood donors.
Whichever sexuality you are, gay or not, the blood service only bars those men who have had sex (oral or anal) with another man, not gay men in general. Gay virgins are free to donate. Straight men who have been raped are barred. Do you see the subtle difference?
It isn’t about equality, gay rights and it isn’t about passing judgment about a group of people. It is about protecting people from the statistical risk that certain activities (gay anal sex, non-medical drug injection, recent tattoos, family history of vCJD, recent travel to malarial regions, working as a prostitute etc.) present.
People are dying of AIDS and hepatitis because of infected blood products given decades ago. The current rules are there to protect people from these small, but real risks. Not every drug user shares dirty needles, not every gay man has casual, unprotected anal sex, prostitution doesn’t automatically lead to disease, but the transfusion services have a duty to protect some of the sickest people in society and must always err on the side of caution.
People who are willing to stop students giving blood are hopefully able to go up the road to University Hospital, stand in the paediatric cancer ward, and explain to parents of children with leukemia that they don’t want local students to donate blood products because of perceived discrimination towards a particular group.
I would suggest that rather than trying to prevent students from giving life saving blood donations, the NUS should be encouraging students permanently unable to donate blood to give their time and act as volunteers for the transfusion services. That way they could actually have a positive impact on people’s live rather than discouraging an activity that benefits every single man, woman and child, straight or gay in Wales.
The NUS are plain wrong on this matter and need to put protecting health above misplaced sexual politics.
Neil Young
1. Sally Wood
Thanks for making your views known on this.
Just to clarify, the NUS do not promote the boycotting of blood drives. They believe, as you do, that it would be wholly unproductive.
Methods used during the ‘donation not discrimination’ campaigns have been to picket the blood drives rather than boycott. In doing this, students, particularly gay and bisexual men who cannot give blood, actively encourage others to do so on their behalf. This has proved very successful in other universities, actually increasing awareness and the volume of people who give blood.
There will be an open debate on ‘donation not discrimination’ in the new year, plase come along to this and express your views there too.