To the dismay of gay-rights activists, the Food and Drug Administration is about to implement new rules recommending that any man who has engaged in homosexual sex in the previous five years be barred from serving as an anonymous sperm donor.
The FDA has rejected calls to scrap the provision, insisting that gay men collectively pose a higher-than-average risk of carrying the AIDS virus. Critics accuse the FDA of stigmatizing all gay men rather than adopting a screening process that focuses on high-risk sexual behavior by any would-be donor, gay or straight.
"Under these rules, a heterosexual man who had unprotected sex with HIV-positive prostitutes would be OK as a donor one year later, but a gay man in a monogamous, safe-sex relationship is not OK unless he's been celibate for five years," said Leland Traiman, director of a clinic in Alameda, California, that seeks gay sperm donors.
Traiman said adequate safety assurances can be provided by testing a sperm donor at the time of the initial donation, then freezing the sperm for a six-month quarantine and testing the donor again to be sure there is no new sign of HIV or other infectious diseases.
Although there is disagreement over whether the FDA guideline regarding gay men will have the force of law, most doctors and clinics are expected to observe it....
So let me get this straight-ish:
- Despite the fact that testing for HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases is relatively simple to do,
- Despite the fact that any sperm bank worth going to already does that sort of testing, because getting sued because you gave a patient HIV is an extraordinarily unpleasant, expensive and above all unnecessary ordeal these days,
- Despite the fact that there are no reasonable scientific grounds whatsoever underlying this recommendation,
Despite all that, the FDA recommends that sperm banks refuse anonymous donations from any men who have had sex with other men in the past five years.
... Well, all-righty, then!
Dr. Deborah Cohan, an obstetrics and gynecology instructor at the University of California, San Francisco, said some lesbians prefer to receive sperm from a gay donor because they feel such a man would be more receptive to the concept of a family headed by a same-sex couple. "This rule will make things legally more difficult for them," she said. "I can't think of a scientifically valid reason -- it has to be an issue of discrimination."
I do agree that it's nothing more than discrimination, yes. That's all it could possibly be, given, as mentioned, that any reputable clinic will be doing that sort of testing anyway.
That said ... about the only reason to specify the sexual orientation of the donor in the first place is to practice some odd sort of genetic craps. Lesbian's egg plus gay man's sperm = higher chance of gay kid. Assuming that there is a genetic component to homosexuality, then yes, it likely does mean you have a higher chance of getting a gay kid. But the receptiveness of the donor to the idea of a same-sex household is just a nonstarter; why on earth would that matter, once you have the sperm? If the kid winds up needing or wanting to trace the father later on -- and most clinics will not allow that for other than some dire health reasons, although some states have started requiring that the records be kept and released to the child under certain specific circumstances -- that's the only time the father's opinion on anything at all might matter.
Frankly, it feels like both sides are playing some genetic pool here. The archconservatives controlling the government, and what was once a proud scientific branch thereof, are themselves using the opportunity to reduce the number of gay kids around, just a little. Of course ... this would also seem to concede that there is a major genetic component to homosexual orientation, now wouldn't it?
Posted by iain at May 05, 2005 04:55 PM
