This petition was submitted during the 2015 to 2017 Parliament
Rejected petition Gay people should be allowed to donate blood just the same as straight people.
Rejected on
Currently, gay people are not allowed to donate blood through the NHS, due to higher STD risks. However, these risks are still present in everyone - it should be an all-or-nothing approach.
The NHS claim that the higher risk factor of blood-borne diseases (for example, AIDS) is the reason for the gay blood ban. However, straight people can and do catch these diseases as well - The blood should be properly screened and all people subjected to the same rule set, regardless of their sexual orientation.
The current rules suggest that infected blood from straight people could potentially be transfused - which is a huge risk in general. Their efforts are focused in the wrong place.
Why was this petition rejected?
There’s already a petition about this issue. We cannot accept a new petition when we already have one about a very similar issue.
You are more likely to get action on this issue if you sign and share a single petition.
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/170131
We only reject petitions that don’t meet the petition standards.