Boxing Day Blood Drive 2, Electric Boogaloo

November 21, 2007 6:50 AM

A couple folks sounded up for another go-round of the Boxing Day Blood Drive. Shout out and coordinate within if you're interested in donating blood 'round then.

If you want to donate, you can search for a local blood center at America's Blood or browse their list. If your state or nation isn't listed there, try the AABB's Blood Bank Locator.

My offer to Lawrence, Kansas Metafilter people still stands: donate with me and I'll buy you a pint of beer (or a nice coffee-based beverage) afterwards. And maybe chips and salsa, too.

posted by cog_nate to MetaFilter-Related at 6:50 AM (30 comments total)

I'm down, obviously. If we have anything like a sizable number of people in any one city it would probably be best to notify a donor clinic and warn them.
posted by Skorgu at 7:42 AM on November 21, 2007

Sorry, I'm afraid that people will have to do without my incredibly clean, incredibly common-typed blood for no good reason whatsoever.
posted by hermitosis at 7:48 AM on November 21, 2007

Definitely call ahead for appointments. Blood centers often are minimally staffed on such semi-holidays. (Can't join in: I gave on Veteran's Day.)
posted by Carol Anne at 8:13 AM on November 21, 2007

I'm with hermitosis. Legalized discrimination prevents me from donating blood.
posted by dirtynumbangelboy at 8:23 AM on November 21, 2007

It's been too long since I donated. What we need is something like WeEndure.com for blood donation. I'd be passing out at the cookie table every single week with a fake ID. I'd school you all.
posted by Plutor at 8:33 AM on November 21, 2007

I should indeed go again, but with it being a legal holiday and all it probably won't happen on Boxing Day.
posted by GuyZero at 9:01 AM on November 21, 2007

I'm with hermitosis. Legalized discrimination prevents me from donating blood.

Honest question: How do they know you're gay? You'd have to tell them, right? I'm just thinking out loud here, but it seems that being gay prevents you from donating blood in the same way that me not being 21 prevents me from drinking. Wink wink. Nudge nudge.

Just a thought, though I can understand if you'd rather not go that route based on principle. It's a pretty fucked up rule.

I've never donated blood. I think this is as good a time to start as any.
posted by CitrusFreak12 at 9:10 AM on November 21, 2007

I used to lie about it, CitrusFreak, years ago when I was donating plasma for extra cash. I'd been tested, I wasn't sexually active, and I had no qualms about lying to them if it meant the difference between eating that week or not.

Standing on principle is important to me now (that I can afford it). There's no incentive to lift the discrimination if they're getting blood from all the "good" gays already. Why buy the cow when you can get the blood for free?

I support the rest of y'all, didn't mean to derail.
posted by hermitosis at 9:22 AM on November 21, 2007

I think my Western Caribbean cruise in September disqualifies me for a year, so I'm out.
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 9:40 AM on November 21, 2007 [1 favorite]

Yep. I'm out too.

I liked doing it last year. I never gave blood before. It was fun.
posted by Stynxno at 9:46 AM on November 21, 2007

I'm down as soon as I stop leaking mucous from every orifice.
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 10:43 AM on November 21, 2007

If I can remember to take my iron pills for the two weeks before, I'm in. I go to Blood Banks of the Pacific on (I think it's) Bush Street in downtown SF. I think I'm a "universal donor," that means type O I think.
posted by ClaudiaCenter at 11:24 AM on November 21, 2007

I also will stand on principle and refuse to benefit others based on government ignorance.
posted by disclaimer at 11:26 AM on November 21, 2007

I don't know how you can drink afterward, cog_nate. I'm woozy enough at that point!

I'm in for the Baltimore-DC area. I'm hoping they won't have to run a hematocrit this time. The finger pricking makes the 16 gauge needle seem like a breeze.

If you are physically capable of donating but are unable to donate blood for transfusions for any reason, you may still be able donate blood for biomedical research at a local research center. I'd have done so this past year when I was ineligible due to travels, except that I'd also been anemic.
posted by zennie at 12:41 PM on November 21, 2007

In Ireland - and this was at least in the 60's - they would give blood donors a bottle of Guinness to assist in the recuperation.
posted by Sk4n at 1:07 PM on November 21, 2007

hermitosis, dnab: I did not know that. Unbelievable.
posted by typewriter at 1:24 PM on November 21, 2007

Well, if it makes it any better, in Canada they don't discriminate against just gay people. If you ate beef in Britain, if you had sex with nearly anyone from Africa, if you use drugs, if you have sex (even hetro) with a drug user and since we need to be sure, if you had hetro sex with someone you don't know really well (e.g. they might have been an IV drug user or from Africa) then they disqualify you.

I feel like a very boring person every time I go through the interview.
posted by GuyZero at 1:31 PM on November 21, 2007

zennie, I find the post-donation apple juice and Oreos amazingly rejuvenative.

GuyZero, like last year, a lot of folks couldn't donate exactly on Boxing Day but did around Christmas/New Year, a few days after or a week before. And donors in the US will get rejected for the same reasons you listed... still doesn't make the anti-gay discrimination right.

Why buy the cow when you can get the blood for free? is a good punchline for, "What did one chupacabra say to the other?"
posted by cog_nate at 2:39 PM on November 21, 2007

GuyZero, I think that's pretty similar to the rules in the US. But usually people aren't born having eaten beef in Britain, hence the uproar over no gay blood.
posted by Plutor at 2:49 PM on November 21, 2007

hermitosis, dnab: I did not know that. Unbelievable.


Want to know funny?

A friend of mine is unable to give blood, because he is a man who has had sex with a man since 1980. (That's how they word the rule, or used to anyway).

They refused to listen when he would patiently try to explain that he has had sex with only one man since 1980, who happens to be the same man with whom he has been having monogamous sex since approximately 1957.

Rules is rules, y'see.
posted by dirtynumbangelboy at 3:43 PM on November 21, 2007

Okay everyone, let's not debate the merits of the FDA's rulings on blood donations. Whether you agree with it or not, bitching about it on MeTa is not going to help the blood supply!

What WILL help the blood supply is you going out to donate blood. If you're ineligible for any reason, recruit a friend! The blood supply is always low during the holidays. Patients really need your help!
posted by radioamy at 4:50 PM on November 21, 2007

I can't give blood, someone want to donate on my behalf?

Also, just curious - do they ban slutty straight people? /NOT SLUTTIST
posted by SassHat at 5:02 PM on November 21, 2007 [1 favorite]

SassHat: no, not really. I could be in a long-term monogamous relationship, tested for every blood-borne disease under the sun, and I would still be refused while they let some random girl who sleeps with random men give blood.

It is fucking disgusting legalized discrimination, and while obviously blood donation is a very good thing, I refuse to support the system until the wrong is redressed.
posted by dirtynumbangelboy at 7:05 PM on November 21, 2007

I'm going to give blood just to make all y'all homosexuals jealous. I'm trite like that.
posted by dhammond at 7:06 PM on November 21, 2007

We will be passing around a rainbow donation tray, upon which we expect you to place your post-donation cookies. Feel free to keep the juice, since that doesn't ship well.

Happy donating.
posted by CKmtl at 7:27 PM on November 21, 2007

Thank you thank you thank you all who donate blood around holidays. I want to write 'thank you' 1000 times.
posted by dog food sugar at 5:44 AM on November 22, 2007

If you live near a cancer center you can go to there blood bank. Cancer patients need your blood.

I understand the frustration of not being eligible to donate and angry at the reasons, but.... as an RN, these days when we're low and I have to now - on top of everything else - worry if I'll get that unit of PRBC or platelets or not, and in the meantime I have to worry if my patient is going to start spontaneously bleeding because they coughed or start having scary respiratory issues, this frustration you feel is the least important thing in my life ever.
posted by dog food sugar at 5:58 AM on November 22, 2007

dog food sugar, you said it very well.
posted by radioamy at 10:41 PM on November 23, 2007

Oh, and for the record, barring a cold or flu between now and then I'll be donating at the Lawrence community blood center ~4 pm on the 26th.
posted by cog_nate at 6:58 AM on November 26, 2007

Just to bump this in people's recent activity, is anyone in NYC interested in this? I'll make arrangements with the NY Blood Center people if that would help.
posted by Skorgu at 1:21 PM on November 29, 2007