“We have about 1,600 employees who are involved in donor-facing activities. Health Canada, which acts as the regulator for Canadian Blood Services, took longer than the aimed 90 days to complete their review of the blood supply organization’s December submission to make this change, but Health Canada says their authorization “is based on a thorough assessment of evidence supporting the safety of the revised donor screening.”Īsked why it’ll still take months to see the screening process implemented, Sher said a main factor is that the agency had to wait for Health Canada to sign off on their planned approach before starting to train their staff. “We look forward to welcoming new donors into our facilities,” said Graham Sher, CEO of Canadian Blood Services during a media availability. If they have, they would not be able to donate until they had gone three months without engaging in that activity. It will mean that when all donors are screened before rolling up their sleeves, they’ll be asked whether they have recently engaged in anal sex in the context of new or multiple sexual partners within the last few months. It will apply to both blood and plasma donations, outside of Quebec. Moving away from a blanket ban, the national blood donor organization will screen all donors based on higher risk sexual behaviours, regardless of gender or sexuality.Ĭanadian Blood Services (CBS) says it plans to introduce the new behaviour-based questionnaire approach “no later” than Sept. A policy change years in the making, on Thursday Health Canada approved Canadian Blood Services’ submission to eliminate the three-month donor deferral period for gay and bisexual men as well as some other folks in the LGBTQ2S+ community.