Read on Twitter
Another blood donation campaign. National blood bank santse e gana madi a di gay? Kgotsa kea le tlhodia?
Me, reading about the National blood bank being dryer than a Nando’s bun. Thinking, I’m healthy as a horse with negative HIV & STI screens, in the right age & weight category, only medication I’m on is Salbutamol. Then I remember gore ke le homosexual.
If the policy has changed (which I highly doubt), then it’s another indication of what I said yesterday; gays are at best, a political inconvenience or social accessory for a lot of our national institutions and such change will only be because it is now
a) inconvenient for to single out gays and MSM as non-viable donors at the expense of [largely] cishet lives
b) realisation that inclusion of queer-targeted recruitment could open doors to more [international donor] funding and technical support
b) realisation that inclusion of queer-targeted recruitment could open doors to more [international donor] funding and technical support
If you’re still wondering if the National blood bank refuses blood from homosexual donors. Here’s two news articles from 2014 to that effect; MoH initially denied the allegation, was challenged in court by BONELA.
https://www.sundaystandard.info/govt-denies-barring-gays-and-lesbians-from-donating-blood/ https://www.gaystarnews.com/article/activists-take-botswana-ban-lgbti-people-donating-blood-court050614/
https://www.sundaystandard.info/govt-denies-barring-gays-and-lesbians-from-donating-blood/ https://www.gaystarnews.com/article/activists-take-botswana-ban-lgbti-people-donating-blood-court050614/
Here’s snippets from above mentioned news articles, if you can’t get to the articles for whatever reason.
The reality is, this ban isn’t unique to Botswana and has actually been encouraged by WHO since the 1980s. UK only eased restrictions on gay & bisexual men donors in 2020 & the US only lifted the blanket ban on gay and bisexual men in 2015.
In both, there’s still either a stipulation on celibacy or that the donor having been with their partner for a minimum of three months. In general, the rules call for a 3-month wait after a man has had sex with another man.
If you’re asking if the National blood bank ASKS people if they’re gay, I cannot say definitively, but this can be determined in the screening questions when donors are asked of their sexual history. Once again, discrimination isn’t always overt, especially if it’s institutional.
