2008 Woodie Awards
Campus blood drive: Another excuse to claim discrimination
ICC's refusal to endorse life-saving event another example of political correctness at its extreme
James Schulte
Issue date: 10/30/06 Section: Opinion
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We've always known that political correctness would kill people some day. And if some people had their way, the health of many would be compromised to protect the feelings of a few. De Anza Colleges Inter-Club Council decided not to sponsor this Tuesdays campus blood drive because of discrimination concerns of those who aren't eligible to donate.
The problem is that were not the first college to politicize blood donation. The debate has become so heated at many universities they have prohibited the Red Cross or other blood banks from organizing blood drives on their campuses.
The same thing may end up happening at De Anza if students keep sounding the "discrimination" alarm.
So what are these discrimination concerns that the ICC had about the blood drive? It has to do with who is permanently restricted from giving blood: intravenous drug users, any man who has had sex with another man since 1977 (even once), hemophiliacs, anyone who has had hepatitis any time after their eleventh birthday, cancer patients, stroke victims, and those with multiple sclerosis.
There are many types of people who can never give blood. But the political correctness addicts seem to focus solely on the ineligibility of gay men.
But the Red Cross and other organizations that collect blood donations are not a bunch of homophobes as the charge of discrimination implies. There are logical reasons why gay men and others on the restricted list cannot give blood. The United States has a three-step safety system to keep the blood supply safe from infection.
The first step is donor deferral. This policy restricts any of those who have any infectious agents from giving blood in the first place. Potential donors are asked specific, intimate questions about their health and lifestyle before they are able to give blood.
The second step is testing all blood donations for a range of infectious diseases. The problem with this is what is called "the window period." HIV antibodies take time to develop in the blood. So, an infected persons blood test could come up clean on the day of the donation and their tainted blood could be given to someone else.
The third step is regulating and inspecting the blood banks to ensure they have correct safety measures to identify infected blood and not letting it enter the countrys blood supply.
The Red Cross has not been able to do this since at least 1985, which has the FDA filing lawsuits and asking for more government action.
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