FDA panel backs expanded use of Pfizer HIV drug
(Adelphi, Md.) Federal health advisers said Thursday that Pfizer’s HIV drug Selzentry should be approved for use by patients who have not already taken other drugs to combat the virus.
The Food and Drug Administration’s panel of virus experts voted 10-4 in favor of the new use, despite some inconsistency in …
Gay Montclair University Student Protests Ban on Donating Blood
A 20-year-old sophomore at Montclair State University, Weinstein signed up to donate blood last November at a Red Cross blood drive on campus because, he said, “I thought it would be a nice thing to do.”
But when Weinstein, who is gay, answered “yes” on a questionnaire asking whether or not he had had sexual relations with another man since 1977, American Red Cross volunteers running the drive told him that he was ineligible to be a donor.
“My initial reaction was absolute shock. I thought, there’s no way,” Weinstein, a Randolph native, said last week.
For the past several months, blood supplies around New Jersey have hit critically low levels. Karen Ferriday, a spokeswoman for Community Blood Services in Oradell, said blood stores, which optimally provide three to five days worth of blood, have fallen to half-day supplies for the past several months.
Still, donors like Weinstein have found themselves turned away from donating because a Food and Drug Administration regulation born at the height of the AIDS scare in 1983 still places a lifetime ban on blood donations by gay and bisexual men.
Women who have had sex with a gay or bisexual partner are out, too.
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Gay Montclair University Student Protests Ban on Donating Blood
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Original source : http://gay_blog.blogspot.com/2009/03/gay-montclair…
FDA approves new HIV blood test
(Washington) Federal regulators have approved a new HIV test that screens for two, less common forms of the virus.
The Food and Drug Administration said the TaqScreen MPX Test is the first to simultaneously detect HIV-2 and HIV-1 Group O strains. Both types of HIV are mainly found among patients in …
