So I’m initiating a new policy regarding the gay blood ban. Max: You know, the gay blood ban? It’s not just a regulation. GLAAD continues to fight against the policy, calling it “stigmatizing” and even trying to falsely claim “risk factors for HIV transmission including behaviors such as having unprotected sex and having multiple sex partners are identical regardless of someone’s sexual orientation.”Ĭonfronted with the current policies, Max calls them “bigoted” and “hate” (the same language GLAAD uses) and says he’s going to ignore the federal rules. While blood donations from gay men began to be prohibited at the height of the AIDS crisis, in 2015, the Food and Drug Administration changed the lifetime ban to a 12-month deferral window, then recently to a 3-month deferral to combat extreme blood shortages under COVID.
And as far as I can tell, you aren’t doing a damn thing about them either.” Max is sympathetic because “It did circumvent an ugly, very discriminatory regulation” and confronts the medical director at the time for stopping it who says, “You know, the last time I checked, those were still the FDA guidelines. In one storyline, New Amsterdam Medical Director Max Goodwin (Ryan Eggold) learns that in 1986 during the height of the AIDS epidemic the blood bank director, a gay man, concealed the identities of gay donors to allow them to donate blood in violation of federal policy.
New Amsterdam must be gunning for a GLAAD Media Award nomination with its latest episode: “The Legend of Howie Cournemeyer.”įocused on the hospital’s free HIV-testing day, Tuesday night’s episode campaigned against “bigoted” restrictions on blood donations from gay men, denigrated The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, and was bookended with gay sex scenes.