Expanding the Blood Pool: The Limitations of the FDA’s Current MSM Blood Deferral

Abstract

Amid the emergence of the HIV pandemic in 1985, the blood donation ban for men who have sex with men (MSM) from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) was instituted as a lifetime ban on donation for all MSM who had sex with another man even once since 1977, regardless of the details of the sex or the men’s health. It is overseen by the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research. In 2015, the FDA announced it would change the ban to a 12-month deferral period from the last time the individual had sex with another man.