As blood donations decline, U.S. ban on gay donors is examined

[Dakine10 5,452]

Wow, I'm really surprised by all of this. Didn't America also have BSE?

Yes, but it probably wouldn't work out too well if they deferred everyone in America. For Britain, the deferral is if you spent six months there between 1980 and 1996. There's also a deferral for time spent in France, and time spent in Europe overall but I forgot the specifics of those.

It's a little strange since there is no evidence of human to human transmission of BSE in blood, but again given the latency period and severity of the disease, I understand why they decided to err on the side of caution.

[rocks 494]

Yes, but it probably wouldn't work out too well if they deferred everyone in America. For Britain, the deferral is if you spent six months there between 1980 and 1996. There's also a deferral for time spent in France, and time spent in Europe overall but I forgot the specifics of those.

It's a little strange since there is no evidence of human to human transmission of BSE in blood, but again given the latency period and severity of the disease, I understand why they decided to err on the side of caution.

I agree. It's just odd as USA also had BSE. It is definitely better for them to err on the side of caution for all of these things, better to be safe than sorry.