Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2005. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
San Francisco Chronicle - May 6, 2005
Rona Marech, rmarech@sfchronicle.com.
An FDA rule that goes into effect late this month says that all sperm banks must screen out anonymous donors who are at increased risk for HIV.
It's a concomitant "guidance" document that critics oppose: It says men who have had sex with men in the last five years are at such an increased risk. Critics of the guidelines said they are not enforceable by law, unlike FDA rules. But some are still outraged.
"It doesn't make scientific sense," said Hayley Gorenberg, deputy legal director at Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund. "And the fallout from it is stigmatizing and unnecessary because we have the testing procedures and protocol in place to protect people receiving donor sperm."
At the Sperm Bank of California in Berkeley, donors are tested and screened, the sperm is quarantined for six months, and then donors are tested again, said Alice Ruby, the executive director.
"It's incredibly safe," Ruby said. "In 23 years in business, we have never had an incident of disease transmission."
There are a few documented cases of HIV transmission through sperm donation, but those cases arose in the early stages of the epidemic before current procedures were in place, Gorenberg said.
"They're asking all the wrong questions," said Assemblyman Mark Leno, D- San Francisco, who has protested similar rules that prohibit gay men from donating blood. "It's not with whom you are having sex, it's what kind of sex you are having. Heterosexual men engaging in risky heterosexual behavior are not denied the opportunity to donate sperm. ... This is not about protecting the public."
Both Ruby and Leland Traiman -- director of Rainbow Flag Health Services and Sperm Bank in Alameda, which has a large gay and lesbian clientele -- said they plan to continue to accept sperm from gay donors because they do not consider the FDA guidelines legally enforceable.
Many lesbians eventually want to know the identity of their donor, and "a lot of them feel they will find more acceptance of their families from gay donors," Traiman said.
Many sperm banks won't be affected by the new guidelines because they already reject gay donors. Also, the new rules affect only anonymous donors, not "directed" donors, who give sperm to someone they know.
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