Blood donation

[thekumquat]

I like to think that the world can be changed by pieces of paper and electrons being shuffled about. So when I get involved in activism I'll be writing pointed but polite letters, which often are quite effective. Finally sent an email to Access to Work asking them to explain why they refuse to send out blank forms, insist they have no fax or email

Comments

[lovingboth]

There's a new THT campaign out, 'Cover it', which has a tagline about 9 in 10 gay men using condoms.

The small print says it's 86% (so 6 in 7) having ever used one in the past year... which is a bit different.

Unfortunately, the survey this is based on (last year's Gay Men's [sic] Sex Survey) hasn't been released to mere mortals yet.

So looking at the GMSS results in London 2005, covering several thousand men...

97% had had a male partner in the past year (and 10% at least one female one), but how many?

15.8% one male partner in past year
22.6% two - four
26.8% five - twelve
17.2% thirteen - twenty nine
17.6% thirty plus

So, some of them have been busy.

Almost three quarters had sex with a man whose HIV status they did not know - how many know about themselves?

28.7% have never tested
34.2% -ve test in past year
24.7% -ve test longer ago
12.4% +ve

Overall, only about half have been to a GUM clinic in the past year and we know (from anonymous testing) that a quarter to a third of HIV+ve gay men don't know they're HIV+ve.

Looking at fucking,

50.0% never fucked without a condom (about half of whom never fucked)
10.3% were fucked by someone without a condom
13.3% fucked someone without a condom
26.3% did both

.. so half have been, by this definition, 'naughty'. This is consistent, year on year, and it tends to be a somewhat different group each time.

Personally, I don't see a sensible alternative to a complete ban, even if it can feel insulting.

The behaviour of the target group is fully consistent with the continuing level of new infections. A large number think they've HIV- when they're not. If some new STI comes along, it's going to show up in gay and bisexual men first.

You could get donations off the ones you've just given a -ve test to ('the results from the little prick of blood are negative, can I have an armful?') but...