It's frustrating

[xp_wallflower]

As a medical professional, there are often decisions you make that are difficult and at times the choices you make can appear cruel, or even heartless but you do the best you can with the resources and the knowledge that you have.

Firstly, an older article on the costs of blood screening, these are for tests that they already have and know what to test for:

https://www.texmed.org/Template.aspx?id=754

The health system in America is broken - there are no buts about it. Money plays way too much of a role in the system and the choices made due to that fact can be draconian.

Not taking openly mutant blood is as much about cost as it is about prejudice, although I do believe there is fear involved.

It is much, much easier to simply say 'We will not allow mutants to donate' then it is to fund research into new blood screening that will take into account the huge variance of possible mutations and how their blood might interact with that of a recipient.

I am not saying the decision by the Mayo clinic is right, or fair, or helpful in any way. I do not excuse the results of fear, even if it can be warranted. But there is more then just one side of this story. Do not blame the people on the ground for these decisions. They have a job to do just as everyone else does. If you must protest, then protest where it's needed, at the executive level, at the Government level.

Or go into business and design those new blood screening tests and then offer them to the Red Cross and other donation places for free.

Comments

[xp_wildchild]

Laurie. No. You're being a weird robot. Not letting visible mutants donate blood is just fucking bigotry, just like not letting dudes who are currently fuckin' other dudes donate is bigotry. It's not like the mad cow and for fuck's sake, I googled for 15 seconds and a test for vCJD is right around the fucking corner.

First FIRST OF ALL that article's saying that the risk of getting a disease from blood donation is so low that extra testing is not worth it, learn to read.

SECOND My fucking TEETH aren't contagious, Laurie.

Third Ken Orlotan is a bigoted assclown and get better sources for your "Oh well it's okay to be a bigot if it means we spend a little bit less to save someone's life" that doesn't come from a guy whining about how much HASSLE it was to implement the ACA in Texas.

[xp_erverse]

I literally hope you die.

[xp_havok]

Quentin, down.

Serious question - has anyone actually looked into this? Like, I literally donated blood -all the time- in California and I've never heard anything about anyone getting some weird mutated mutation thingy (excuse me inability to use Science words) after getting a blood transfusion. Lor, too, and no one ever turned green or anything. And I'm pretty sure something weird happening to someone after a blood transfusion would make the news.

Other than bigotry, what's the excuse? If our mutation doesn't effect our blood, then what harm will it do to a regular person? And if we're going to go down the road of "mutants can't donate to regular people" then we'd also have to address "Can mutants with different mutations donate to each other if there's actually an effect?"

You seem smarter than me in the whole biology thing, and I think you already know the answer to that last one. It's BS. If I donate blood to Q, he's not going to suddenly blow up. If I donate to blood to a non-mutant, then... what? Presumably the same thing, because my mutation isn't in my blood, it's in my... I'll get back to you on that one because I'm not entirely sure myself.

If the mutation effects the mutant's blood - like, idk, they have poison blood or something, is that a thing? - then sure, okay, they probably shouldn't be donating to anyone, mutant or not. If they just have pointy bits or a tail then why not? They're not going to pass on their tail to whoever gets their blood.

[xp_scarlet_witch]

Apologies, Laurie, but protesting at the places that take on the policy is exactly what protesters should be doing. On top of protesting at every level between the Mayo Clinic and the government.

Of course they have a job to do. But science is not infallible and people have, and probably will continue to do so, make poor - and bigoted decisions - in its name.

[xp_blackwidow]

The people in high places don't care about protests until it makes the news. Protests like this, like Wanda said, are exactly what's needed. People like that need their hands forced to make decisions that go against their own agendas.