KEVIN MENZ
Associate News Editor

In the Sept. 23 issue, the Sheaf published an article regarding Madam Justice Catherine Aitken of the Superior Court of Ontario denying Kyle Freeman’s requests to donate blood because of his history of having sex with other men. This article raised a lot of questions among students regarding the ban on gay blood donations, so we decided to do a follow-up interview with Ron Vezina, spokesperson from Canadian Blood Services, to clarify what the ruling means.

How is Canadian Blood Services not subject to the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms?
Vezina noted that the first question the judge asked in the trial was whether or not Canadian Blood Services was subject to the charter.

“The charter does not apply to us only because we are not a government organization,” said Vezina. “For a lot of people it’s an eye-opener that the Charter of Rights only applies to government organizations. Even for myself, I thought everyone in Canada was subject to the charter but they’re not — it’s for government organizations.”

Nevertheless, it’s an issue that Canadian Blood Services was still interested in exploring.

“Just because the charter doesn’t apply to us doesn’t mean it’s not an issue of human rights. We asked for the trials because the judge said ”˜If the court rules that the charter does not apply to CBS, does CBS want the judge’s opinion on whether it is discriminatory or not?’ ”

Of course, the judge ruled that the patient receiving blood was the priority, not the donor.

Is there a higher risk of HIV infection in men who have had sex with other men than in straight individuals who engage in anal sex?
“Absolutely. We use the official data from the Public Health Agency of Canada and according to their statistics, men who have sex with other men represent the highest risk group for HIV/AIDS. Actually, they are an even higher risk than all the other groups combined.”

Why is the ban against donations from men who have had sex with men permanent?
“When we looked at this issue a couple years back in 2006, we did some consultations with the Canadian Federation of Students and with other LGBTTQ members. They told us that changing the deferral period was tokenism. They said, ”˜If you change it to five years you are still asking me to be abstinent as a man who has sex with another man.’ ”

This means that health officials considered five years adequate time for a virus to be completely detected — remember, it can sometimes take a long time for HIV/AIDS symptoms to present themselves. However, asking for five years of abstinence was not a practical option so they kept the ban permanent.

Therefore, in order to better research blood screening methods, Canadian Blood Services offered research funding

“That is where our efforts were put,” said Vezina. “We put $1 million worth of research money on the table and unfortunately no one has taken us up on the offer yet.”

Are there other groups that are permanently banned?
“Since testing is not perfect, we start accepting only from the most risk-free donors. In some cases it means you take whole categories of people and you apply deferral periods against them. It’s the same rational as people that have lived in the U.K. between 1980 and 1986 because of the threat of Mad Cow Disease. Some of them might be vegetarians but it doesn’t matter. If they lived there between that period of time they are automatically out.

People who have lived in African countries where HIV and AIDS rates are endemic can’t give blood ever, at all. It’s not making value judgements about people, it’s just saying that if you are part of a high-risk category, we’ve got to preclude you from giving blood.”

In Canada — and Saskatchewan especially — studies have shown that the rates of HIV/AIDS in Aboriginal women are increasing tremendously every year. Would Canadian Blood Services ever consider banning a high-risk group based on ethnicity (i.e. Aboriginal women) as opposed to one based on sexual orientation?
“It’s not about being gay. If you are gay but are a virgin, this policy does not apply to you. If you are a heterosexual man but have had one experience with another man, this policy does apply to you.”

He then noted that only 49 per cent of men who claim to have had sex with another man identify themselves as homosexual. This same idea, he said, works with the Aboriginal women demographic.

“It’s not because they are women or they are Aboriginal, it’s because of the risky activities they are involved in; it’s not because he’s gay but because he’s had sex with another man. If what people do puts them at risk, then absolutely they get deferred.”

Since it is possible for anyone to lie on the Canadian Blood Services donation survey, shouldn’t CBS adapt better testing strategies and put less trust in the surveys?
Vezina noted that contrary to popular rumour, CBS does use the most advanced form of testing and that the infection to detection window is not, in fact, three months but 10 to 14 days.

“It’s called Nucleic Acid Amplification Testing and the window period for the most common strains of HIV are thought to be between 10 days to two weeks.”
He also noted, however, that even this test is not perfect and that the “first layer of defence is still donor selection.”

Are there any other options for men who have had sex with men to donate — even if it isn’t blood?
“They can be stem cell donors or they can register a once-match donor base,” said Vezina. “There are Canadians dying everyday because there are not enough stem cell donors and there’s not enough organs and tissues.”

Therefore, he notes, the donation policies are less strict because there is a shortage of those types of donors — unlike blood, to which he says there isn’t actually a shortage.

“We do collect a million units of blood a year. We don’t have any shortages. Every time you hear us on the radio it is to replenish our supplies but there is no one in Canada who is dying right now because of a lack of blood.”

Any final comments on researching blood donation options for men who have sex with men?
“If there are epidemiologists and researchers out there who are interested in tackling this issue, we have over $1 million worth of funding with the Canadian Institute of Health Research that they can help us better understand a number of issues related to this policy.”

Vezina noted that if this money is taken and used to research blood donation among the men who have sex with men category, they might eventually be able to have enough concrete evidence to accept gay blood donations.

“The problem is right now there is no evidence and given the history of the blood system in Canada, Canadians aren’t interested in becoming guinea pigs or experimenting with things. They want some evidence that any changes we propose are proven safe.”

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image: Denise Chan/Flickr