Equality on Campus

[jbailey]

I'm pleased to see that the McGill Student Union is now refusing to allow blood drives until anti-homosexual discriminatory questions on the questionnaire can be dropped. The problem is one of stupid questions combined with discrimination. My friend Katy put it best about when she went to fill out the questionnaire: "No, I can't guarantee that I know my partner's sexual history. But I'm willing to bet my life on it."

According to an article on a recent Public Health Agency of Canada report:

The PHAC report reveals that 51 per cent of those infected with HIV continue to be men who engage in homosexual activity.

(Note that the lifesite.net is a Christian, pro-life, anti-gay website. I don't have time at the moment to dig out either a better source or the original report.)

Perhaps I'm doing my math wrong, but at the point when 49% are those who don't identify as homosexual (and 40% of those are women), then you've probably got a third to half a chance that someone in that line isn't a man who's had sex with a man and could be HIV infected.

I hope that the McGill protest puts enough pressure on Health Canada to review this policy and drop the discrimination completely.

Comments

But

[(Anonymous)]

Given that homosexual men make up around 5% of the population, per capita homosexual men are much more likely to be HIV infected than the general population.

Not that more sensitivity couldn't be applied, but simple risk factors like man who has sex with men or injection-drug user are strong indicators of HIV and other infections.

Re: But

[(Anonymous)]

Let x be the number of Canadians infected with HIV 51% * x = number of Canadians infected with HIV who have had gay sex. Assume 10% of Canadians have had homosexual sex (probably a conservative figure; it was based upon Kinsey's research, the subjects of which were not randomly selected). Assume 50% of Canadians who have had homosexual sex are male (I have no idea if this is true or not). Thus there are roughly 30 000 000 * 10% * 50% = 1 500 000 Canadians who have had gay sex. The number of Canadians who have not had gay sex is therefore roughly 30 000 000 - 1 500 000 = 28 500 000. A = (51% * x)/1 500 000 = odds that a Canadian who has had gay sex has HIV B = (49% * x)/28 500 000 = odds that a Canadian who has *not* had gay sex has HIV B / A = 18.255 Conclusion: a Canadian who has had gay sex is roughly 18 times more likely to have HIV than one who has not. The Haema-Québec policy is discriminatory, but they have strong reasons to discriminate.