The FDP Group wants to bring an application in the Bundestag, which should abolish the blood donation ban for gay and transsexual people. A blanket exclusion of gays and transgender people is an untenable discrimination without medical necessity and sharpens the lack of life-saving blood donations, it says in the application, the SPIEGEL.
So far, people with so-called sexual risk behavior may donate blood only under certain conditions: namely, if they had no sex for one year. In November 2017, the German Medical Association eased the guideline for blood collection and the use of blood products. Since then, it has stated that persons with sexual risk behavior, including men who have sex with men and transsexuals, are excluded from the donation for twelve months. According to the directive, male and female prostitutes and heterosexuals with frequently changing sex partners are also affected by the scheme.
According to its own statements, the FDP adheres to the information on "Inter- and Transsexuality" of the Federal Ministry for Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth (BMFSFJ) when formulating its application. Accordingly, the term "transgender" is used as a generic term for all forms of sexual identity - that is, the perceived gender of a person. The "Guideline Hemotherapy / Transfusion Medicine" of the German Medical Association lists explicitly "Men who have sexual intercourse with men" as well as "Transsexual persons with sexual risk behavior".
Before the change, these groups of people were excluded from blood donation for a lifetime. The reason given was that they had an increased risk of contracting HIV or the hepatitis C virus against the general population. The lifestyle details are collected by questionnaire.
- Read here an essay on the topic of our author Enrico Ippolito: Is my blood poisonous?
One year no sex? That is not true to life
"The adaptation in the directive to a waiting period of twelve months since the last sexual intercourse to blood donation is a non-life assumption," it says now in the FDP application, which is introduced by the deputies Jens Brandenburg, Katja Suding and the FDP Group , "Critical to a risk of infection is not the sexual or sexual identity of a person, but the actual risk behavior, for example, through unprotected sexual intercourse with frequently changing partners."
Both prostitution and changing sexual partners would be inquired separately in the "Hemotherapy Directive" anyway. An explicit naming of homosexual and transgender persons as a risk group is an unjustified generalization and discriminatory. "The groups of people as a whole, an unreflected and risky sexual behavior is assumed," write the FDP deputies. It is unquestionable that the medical safety of the donated blood donations have the highest priority.
"We can not afford to exclude people willing to donate on a flat rate because of their sexual or sexual identity of the blood donation," said the Deputy Federal Parliamentary Leader, Katja Suding, the SPIEGEL. "Instead, we need to apply the best testing methods that medical progress is already making available to us today - that's our ethical duty."
more on the subject
In Germany about 14,000 blood donations per day are needed. According to the Red Cross, about 80 percent of Germans need a blood donation once in their lifetime. The demand for life-saving blood donations is very high, but ensuring the supply is becoming an ever greater challenge, it says in the application of the FDP.
"Preserving blood in hospitals is scarce and human lives are at stake," Suding said. Only two to three percent of Germans regularly donated blood.
Due to the demographic change, the number of blood donations will continue to decline in the future, as the age limit for blood donations is 68 for repeat donors. At the same time, demand is increasing due to the growing proportion of older people. In 2015, the European Court of Justice (ECJ) declared general blood donation bans to be inadmissible as long as the health protection of blood donors is guaranteed.