Donor Network Right to Refuse Organs from Homosexual, Says Christian Doc

Granted...this story comes from a hardcore fundie news source but still...it's a harsh reminder of just how fucked up some people and things really are :mad: -->

(AgapePress) - Friends and family of a Tucson man are crying discrimination after the homosexual man's organs were rejected by the Donor Network of Arizona. However, a Kansas surgeon who works in organ transplantation says the decision was a good one.

Albert Soto, 51, intended to donate his eyes and other tissues after death, but a spokesman from the Network says the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta has established guidelines allowing centers to reject donations from men who have had sex with men in the last five years. Dr. David Pauls, a spokesman for the Christian Medical Association, says those guidelines are needed regardless -- even if the donor is HIV negative, as in Soto's case.

"Number one, HIV in early stages cannot be detected on testing; it takes a little bit there," Pauls explains. "But even if he's HIV negative, there's other infectious diseases that are fairly common within the homosexual population -- particularly hepatitis, which can be a very deadly complication in somebody who receives a transplant, and that sometimes also can be missed by screening."

Pauls says the organ donation and transplant business is heavily reliant on trust. "Trust is probably one of the most valuable commodities we have," he says. "If I ... as a physician am going to be doing a transplant, I'm want to do everything I can to make sure that the organs or the tissue that I'm transplanting is safe and is not going to cause other problems or other diseases in that patient."

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http://headlines.agapepress.org/archive/12/72005g.asp

This country is getting taken over by Nazis.

It is NOT gay bashing at all, but transplants have sooo many problems already, if there's any question at all of adding additional problems, I sure can understand the medical reasoning.

I very close friend had a pancreas transplant 5 years ago, and I really do understand most of the risks. They have to try to have everything as close to perfect as they can get just for survival.

just because they receive an organ transplant from a gay guy?

This is ridiculous.

(very much not Red Cross, but they probably have similar standards) routinely asked if I had sex with men in the last so many years. I forget how many. Maybe 5. Maybe fewer.

"Yes" meant "we'll take your blood and throw it away, untested". They'd test for HIV anyway. They also asked if I had visited prostitutes or used needles, or had sex or certain kinds of contact with HIV-positive individuals. If I had, my blood would been pitched. All were risk factors for HIV and other viruses, some difficult to detect.

(I was even CMT negative, which meant they liked my blood: it could be given safely to AIDS patients and other immune-system compromised patients.)

though it's been a while since I last gave blood so it may have changed.