By Scott Tibbs, July 17, 2012
The shameful responses of IU professor Uri Horesh in his July 12 Indiana Daily Student interview demonstrate how completely self-centered, arrogant, childish and hateful this man is. He is an embarrassment to the university.
Horesh actually argued that unless the Red Cross violates federal regulations and accepts blood donations from men who have sex with men (MSM), they should not be permitted to conduct blood drives on campus. That's right, folks. Unless Horesh gets what he wants, he is willing to allow people to die from a lack of needed blood donations.
Horesh needs to realize a very important thing - it is not about you! Blood donations are about helping those in need of blood due to injuries and illnesses, not so that you can make a petulant political statement. Keep in mind that the Red Cross must follow federal guidelines. This is the federal government's policy.
I have pointed this out many times, but let's review the statistics that are available at http://www.cdc.gov/hiv/topics/surveillance/basic.htm. It is a documented scientific fact that male homosexuals are dramatically overrepresented in AIDS and HIV cases in the United States.
Of 41,845 HIV infections tracked by the CDC in 2009, male-to-male sexual contact accounted for 23,846 infections, or 57% of all infections. Furthermore, of the 1,099,161 "cumulative estimated number of AIDS diagnoses" through 2009, the CDC reports that 529,908 of those were the result of male-to-male sexual contact, or 48.2% of all AIDS diagnoses. Male-to-male sexual contact and injection drug use accounted for another 77,213 of all AIDS diagnoses, which amounts to another 7% of AIDS diagnoses.
Horesh whined that not allowing MSM to donate blood is no different than not allowing blacks or women to donate blood. Horesh is an educated man and he knows better than this. AIDS is a behaviorally spread disease. If you do not engage in the behaviors that spread the disease, you will not be infected. The federal government has determined that certain behaviors place one at a high risk of HIV infection, and by far the most dangerous is male-to-male sexual contact. There is no discrimination here.
