Commentary from Family Research Council...
Leaving in place a policy over three decades old, the FDA announced yesterday that it would uphold its rule that homosexual men cannot donate blood. For years, liberal groups have complained that it's "discriminatory" to forbid homosexuals from donating blood. Critics say the policy, implemented in 1983, is outdated because improved testing can detect virtually all HIV-infected blood. The key word here is "virtually." This is about safety--not prejudice. According to the FDA, no test is 100% accurate. One of the many dangers in testing blood is that some strains of the HIV virus remain undetected for several years in a person's body. Back in September 2000, organizations petitioned the FDA to lift the restrictions, arguing that the policy was "archaic." Yet medical advisers--both then and now--voted to keep the ban in place because there wasn't sufficient evidence that it was safe to make the change. The exclusion is based on the prevalence of disease, not on how the FDA feels about a particular group of people. The same can be said of a debate in California, where a homosexual couple sued for the right to be listed as "prospective parents" on an adoption website. As the Alliance Defense Fund, which represented the company, said, "The managers of the adoption profiles believe that it's in the best interests of children to be placed with a married mom and dad." The policy was because of the scientific reality that children fare better physically and emotionally in homes with married, heterosexual parents. Unfortunately, the court ruled on the side of political correctness and ordered the company to "treat everyone equally." As a result, ParentProfiles.com is pulling out of California altogether. In both instances, the FDA and the adoption agency were faulted for refusing to compromise Americans' health to score political points.