And now the FDA wants to use the same asinine rules for sperm donation as for blood donation

[conuly]

Instead of testing donors to make sure they're not sick, they'd rather just exclude a huge swath of the population from donating.

Brilliant plan, guys. Really.

Comments

[stejcruetekie.livejournal.com]

You know, there's really no reason for me to respond to this. It's senseless ramblings by an anonymous wimp. Certainly the other posts in this discussion were much more worthy of responses if I had ever gotten around to it.

But it's a lazy Sunday afternoon, and your post is so ridiculously easy to rip to shreds, that I think I will.

1. You call me a moron because my opinion of "huge" differs from yours. This is not a matter of fact, it is a matter of opinion. 5% of any number is not "huge" to me, in the big picture. That's my opinion, yours differs. Deal with it.

2. You state that gays are not more promiscuous than straights, it's only my perception. Well, I don't see you backing it up with any facts (other than, presumably, your own perception), so I guess we're kind of even, huh? I have been looking around at this, and haven't yet found anything that I consider citation worthy (from *either* perspective), but so far I stand with my current view and experiences.

3. According to the CDC, in 2003 alone there have been 87 cases of HIV infections through blood transfusions, blood components, or tissue. 61 females (http://www.cdc.gov/hiv/stats/2003SurveillanceReport/table22.htm) and 26 males (http://www.cdc.gov/hiv/stats/2003SurveillanceReport/table20.htm). (Look! sources!). Clearly the testing is not 100% accurate and bad blood is slipping through. Technology may be improving, but... Are you volunteering to be one of those 87 unlucky, innocent people?

And lastly, you charge me with spouting hate. Where? I don't see it anywhere. Did I write somewhere that I hate faqs and I think they should all have an orgy in a Hitler era gas "shower"?? No I did not. This issue at hand has nothing to do with homosexuality. Whether or not the governing bodies have some vast right-wing anti-gay conspiracy going on, I don't know and don't care - it has no bearing on my view that they're doing the right thing in this case.

What we are dealing with is a field of science/business known as Risk Management (http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&oi=defmore&q=define:Risk+management). In a nutshell, this is looking at something, determining the various risks associated with it, how those risks can be reduced or eliminated, and at what financial, social, and manageability costs.

Seatbelts have been determined to be a reasonable risk deterrent, despite the initial cost and social inertia. Air bags have been determined to be a reasonable risk deterrent, despite their high cost. 5-point seatbelts have been determined to *not* be a reasonable risk deterrent, likely because of social inertia, even though they no doubt would save a number of additional lives. That is all part of "risk management."

In this case, homosexual males have been determined to be a very high risk group. (And frankly, when I look at the numbers, anyone who tries to claim otherwise is just flat out blind or in denial). The powers that be have decided that there is a reasonable reduction in risk by eliminating that group, at the cost of losing a certain number of safe donations from that group. Cost/benefit analysis, basic business principles.

BTW - that 87 figure I gave above? Or if we go by you, 1 in all of history - that's with these risk management procedures already in place. One would think the number would be a bit higher if we didn't have these guidelines, yes?

Have a good day.

[conuly]

See, I just told him to not flame you. You're just encouraging him.

(Mind, I still think you're wrong, but I'm not going to insult you over it.)

[stejcruetekie.livejournal.com]

Ah, but I don't think of my post as a flame - I think of it as a well written, logical post (with a few sarcastic comments thrown in for good measure).

Of course, it's probably all lost on him/her/it, if he/she/it even bothers to come back and see if there's been any responses.