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Argentina Eliminates ‘Gay Blood Ban’ – Will US Be Next?

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Argentina chooses to save lives by eliminating their discriminatory “gay blood ban.” They now assess donors based on individual risk factors rather than sexual orientation. When will America do the same?

While the United States still has restrictions on gay and bisexual men donating blood, other countries like Italy and Spain are starting to realize that removing these discriminatory bans could decrease stigma and save numerous lives. Argentina is the latest country to strike down the “gay blood bans” and instead assess donors based on individual risk factors.

According to Slate, Health Minister Daniel Gollán declared that the change in policy is “scientifically and technically accurate.” Gollán also explained that, the new policy allows Argentina to finally “move toward a national blood system that is safe, caring, and inclusive.”

Unfortunately, the United States had the opportunity to eliminate the “gay blood ban” last year, but instead choose to implement a one-year deferral method requiring all men who have sex with men to be celibate for an entire year before donating blood. This bizarre change goes against science, and lumps married, monogamous gay men into the same category as IV-drug users and straight people who have frequent unprotected anonymous sex. It’s also important to note that there is no waiting period for straight people who have high-risk, unprotected, sex with partners they meet online or in sex clubs.

Time noted that advocates felt the new U.S. policy was unnecessary and still discriminatory.

“They require men who have sex with men, including married monogamous gay couples, to be celibate for a year. They are not doing this to heterosexuals who could also come in contact with HIV,” Anthony Hayes, vice president of public affairs and policy for Gay Men’s Health Crisis (GMHC) explained. “It’s not based on current science. That’s why you are seeing countries like Argentina make these changes. We have to stop responding to HIV and AIDS like it’s the 1980s. There’s a better way to protect the blood supply and be more inclusive about our policy.”

Members of the American Medical Association (AMA) and the Red Cross also believe bans against gay and bisexual men donating blood are not effective. Dr. William Kobler, AMA board member gave a statement back in 2013 saying it was important to “ensure blood donation bans or deferrals are applied to donors according to their individual level of risk and are not based on sexual orientation alone.”

A 2014 report from The Williams Institute estimated that if the ban were lifted, the U.S. annual blood supply would increase by 2 to 4 percent, which could ultimately help save the lives of more than 1.8 million people. Because eliminating these discriminatory bans in the U.S. could decrease stigma and save over a million lives, the cause made it on our list of important issues the LGBT community should focus on now that marriage equality is legal in all fifty states.

So what do you think? How long will it take the U.S. to eliminate the one-year gay celibacy period and begin screening people by overall risk factors as opposed to sexual orientation? Let us know in the comments section below.

 

RELATED:

Tammy Baldwin, Elizabeth Warren Send Bipartisan Letter Asking To End Gay Blood Ban

FDA Again Pushes Discriminatory Policy Allowing Only Celibate Gay Men To Donate Blood

FDA Panel To Gay Men: We Don’t Want Your Blood

 

Image by lori_greig via Flickr and a CC license

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‘Fool or a Liar’: GOP Knives Out for ‘A–hole’ Matt Gaetz as Vote to Oust McCarthy Appears Likely to Succeed

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October 3, 2023

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House Republicans are expressing outrage at one of their own, U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL), who by day’s end may succeed or come close to ousting Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy for relying on Democrats’ votes to keep the federal government from shutting down Saturday night.

“I prefer, you know, common sense over chaos,” Republican Congressman Anthony D’Esposito, who referred to Congressman Gaetz as an “a–hole,” told Fox News on Tuesday.

“I think that we should be focused on governance rather than grandstanding, and the fact that we have one a–hole that is holding us up and holding America up is a real problem,” D’Esposito added.

Far-right Republican Derrick Van Orden told CNN’s Manu Raju that Gaetz is “either a fool or a liar.”

“I’m telling you,” warned Republican Andy Barr of Kentucky, “it definitely puts the majority in jeopardy when you see disunity.”

READ MORE: Trump Has Now ‘Crossed the Line Into Criminal Threats’: Top Legal Scholar

GOP Rep. Steve Womack of Arkansas said, “I think it’s sending a terrible message to the electorate in advance of the 2024 election that this Republican majority could not govern itself.”

On camera, another Republican called Gaetz “a chaos agent,” and another said: “I don’t have tolerance for some pseudo psycho political fetish.”

Still another warned, “I think it’s sending a terrible signal to the electorate in advance of the ’24 election, that this Republican majority cannot govern itself.”

Watch below or at this link.

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‘Probably So’: McCarthy Says His Speakership Likely Will End After Vote

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October 3, 2023

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The Republican Speaker, Kevin McCarthy, is acknowledging his leadership of the U.S. House of Representatives “probably” is about to end.

“If five Republicans go with Democrats, then I’m out,” McCarthy, sounding resigned to his possible future, told reporters late Tuesday morning. The Speaker acknowledged that if all Democrats vote against him in a vote schedule for Tuesday afternoon, and just five Republicans join them, he will lose his job.

“That looks likely,” ABC’s Rachel Scott told McCarthy.

“Probably so,” he responded.

There are currently at least five Republicans who say they will vote to oust McCarthy, according to CNN’s Haley Talbot, as of last Monday night.

Democrats on Tuesday have said they will not support McCarthy.

U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) has been on a campaign to oust McCarthy, who was elected Speaker in January but only after the House voted 15 times before granting him the gavel. That gavel came with public and private concessions, among them, that any one member of the House could initiate a “motion to vacate,” which Gaetz did Monday night.

Gaetz claims he is working to strip McCarthy of the Speakership because he reached across the aisle and accepted votes from Democrats very late on Saturday to avoid what had been an almost-certain shutdown of the federal government. But McCarthy has long contended for Gaetz it’s “personal,” because the Speaker would not intervene to save Gaetz from a re-opened House Ethics Committee investigation into possible violations including sexual misconduct, unlawful drug use, and public corruption.

if Republicans do succeed on the motion to vacate, there currently is no one named to replace McCarthy. That would leave the position that is second in line to the presidency vacant.

Watch today’s House session live below, starting at 11:45 AM, see his remarks to reporters above, or watch both at this link.

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Trump Has Now ‘Crossed the Line Into Criminal Threats’: Top Legal Scholar

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October 3, 2023

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As Donald Trump’s rhetoric grows increasingly menacing and threatening, experts are again sounding the alarm.

It’s been weeks since Special Counsel Jack Smith asked U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan to impose a narrow limitation on the ex-president in the case charging him with attempting to overturn the 2020 election. It likely will be weeks until that Judge Chutkan announces a decision.

In the mean time, Trump continues to make disparaging remarks and what some have suggested are thinly-veiled threats or calls to action to his supporters against those he perceives as his enemies.

Trump recently suggested that his former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley, “in times gone by” would have been executed for treason.

READ MORE: Gaetz Needs Just Five Republicans to Oust McCarthy – He Already Has Three

Milley’s perceived “treasonous” crime, according to Trump? Making a White House approved call to China to let them know Trump wasn’t planning to attack China, as the AP reported.

Last month, Trump wrote on Truth Social that General Milley “was actually dealing with China to give them a heads up on the thinking of the President of the United States. This is an act so egregious that, in times gone by, the punishment would have been DEATH! A war between China and the United States could have been the result of this treasonous act.”

Special Counsel Jack Smith included that post in his communication with Judge Chutkan on Friday.

Monday morning, inside a Manhattan courthouse before the start of New York Attorney General Letitia James’ $250 million civil fraud case, Trump unleashed an angry rant in front of news cameras, saying, “You ought to go after this attorney general.” He also called New York Supreme Court Justice Arthur Engoron a “rogue judge.”

He added, “now I have to go before a rogue judge, as a continuation of Russia, Russia, Russia, as a continuation of the greatest witch hunt of all time. And I don’t think the people of this country are going to stand for it.”

These were just Trump’s remarks at the start of the day. He faced the cameras two other times, during the lunch break and after the day’s proceedings had ended.

READ MORE: ‘Sodom and Gomorrah’: ND Republican Unleashes Anti-LGBTQ Christian Nationalist Rant Calling for ‘Christ Is King’ Laws

Describing Trump’s remarks, Vanity Fair’s Bess Levin wrote: “Speaking to reporters outside the courtroom, Trump called the case a ‘witch hunt’ and ‘a disgrace,’ saying, ‘You ought to go after this attorney general,’ because if there’s one thing the man loves, it’s a not-so-veiled threat against his enemies.”

Harvard University Professor Emeritus Laurence Tribe, a legal scholar and expert on the U.S. Constitution, on Monday warned Trump’s remarks “crossed the line into criminal threats.”

“Trump’s 1st Amendment freedom of speech includes the right to express his racist views about anyone, including Attorney General Letitia James,” Tribe wrote. “But he has no right to foment violence against her. He crossed the line into criminal threats when he said ‘you ought to go after this attorney general.'”

Former Chicago Tribune editor Mark Jacob, responding to the video, writes: “When Trump says “you ought to go after this attorney general,” we know what he means. Some call it stochastic terrorism, but I call it puppetmaster terrorism. He’s telling his crazed followers who the targets are.”

See the post and video above or at this link.

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