The American Red Cross has declared that we are in a blood crisis right now, with more blood going out to helping patients who need it than there is coming in to replenish the supply. While there has always been a need for blood donors, drives to get donations have been hampered over the last two years by the coronavirus pandemic, and at this time of year, bad winter weather can provide a double whammy.

It certainly seems like a crisis when you consider how much blood can be used to help a single person. In an article in the Rexburg Standard Journal, it was noted that a single car crash victim could need up to 100 pints of blood. For blood drives in a small town, that could be a single day’s donations just wiped out. Statistics show that blood is needed somewhere every two seconds, and when the donations are low, that could mean somebody perishes if the supply isn’t there.

It sounds like we should all be running out, rolling up our sleeves and let the Draculas in the medical community drain us dry, or convincing those who are squeamish about needles or losing blood to conquer their fears and give freely. While that would help, I think it would be wiser for the Red Cross and other blood suppliers to get with the times.

By that, I’m talking about a long-standing policy that makes many gay men prohibited from donating. Recently, my sweetheart, Todd, wanted to donate and do his part to help others. He went in, and he answered the questions that volunteers ask, including the one that asks if you are a man who has had sexual intercourse with another man in the last three months.

Todd was honest and said yes.

Todd was told thank you very much, but we’ll pass.

Why did this happen? This happened after Todd went through an amazing body transformation where he dropped from 315 pounds to just below 200 pounds and is in the best shape of his life. However, because he is a gay man in a relationship, he was told no. He has no sexually transmitted diseases and no other conditions that would disqualify him from giving his blood, but because he and I are a couple, the Red Cross considers him to be Typhoid Mary.

The restriction against gay men donating goes back about 40 years, when the AIDS crisis was ravaging America. Even though it was later found to be an equal-opportunity disease, signs of HIV—the virus that can lead to AIDS—were first discovered in homosexual males, and gay men continue to be disproportionally affected in the number of confirmed positive cases. However, not all gay men have HIV, and not all of them die from AIDS.

Even though facts have shown that HIV and AIDS can infect women, heterosexual men, drug users who use needles and others, those people aren’t automatically weeded out on the questionnaires from the Red Cross. While there have been adaptations—in the beginning, gay men who had sex with another man at any point in their lives were automatically shown the door—Todd and other men are discriminated against and told their blood is not wanted or needed.

Yet now there’s a crisis and calls for all hands on-deck. Health care officials are crying out, “Give! Give! Give!” almost as much as they’re demanding you mask up and get your COVID-19 vaccine. Even so, there is no push to lift the regulation that says sexually active gay men are pariahs when it comes to giving blood, even though Buford could bone a female prostitute half an hour before coming to a blood drive and still be poked with a needle.

Anyone who knows Todd knows he is a very giving person. He regularly gives us Saturdays volunteering at the Restore to help Habitat for Humanity. He has been involved with causes raising money to find the cure for cancer. While he’s not perfect—and none of us are—he should be allowed to give blood when the need arises and should only be prohibited if there is a confirmed medical reason that his blood would be no good.

If the Red Cross is going to cry out that the sky is falling, then it’s going to need to be flexible when it comes to finding a solution to this problem. Continuing to discriminate against gay men does not solve the crisis, and while it might not alleviate the situation to have every drag queen and male hair stylist line up with their arms out, you still might be able to save a few more lives.