What the Department has revealed about the Blood Ban #FOI

I have this afternoon received a response to my Freedom of Information Request about the retention of the lifetime ban on Men who have sex with Men (MSM) donating blood. Here is the reply:

Q 1. For minutes of any meetings that the Minister has had pertaining to the SaBTO report "Donation selection criteria review - men who have had sex with men" 8-Sep-11

A:  No minutes held.

    

Q 2. For details of any information that the Minister has received that conflicts with or supports the quantitative and qualitative substance of the above report. Especially that of the two pieces of the evidence that the Minister announced on 17-Jun-12 that he had received in recent weeks.

A:  Two pieces of information may be released.  Please see relevant attachment to this letter and appropriate links later in this reply (overleaf).

    

Q 3. Minutes of any meetings the Minister has had with professionals in the health and LGBT fields, since receiving this new information, regarding their contents.

A: No meetings have taken place.

    

Q 4. Minutes of any meetings or information that the Minister has had regarding people who have had sex with prostitutes or someone from Africa that has led to his conclusion to lift their 12 month deferral period for blood donations to a lifetime ban.

A: No meetings have taken place and no information held.  

FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT 2000 You wrote to this Department on 17th June 2012 seeking information under the Freedom of Information Act.  Your requests for information are copied below with specific italicised responses.      Q 1. For minutes of any meetings that the Minister has had pertaining to the SaBTO report "Donation selection criteria review - men who have had sex with men" 8-Sep-11 A:  No minutes held.      Q 2. For details of any information that the Minister has received that conflicts with or supports the quantitative and qualitative substance of the above report. Especially that of the two pieces of the evidence that the Minister announced on 17-Jun-12 that he had received in recent weeks. A:  Two pieces of information may be released.  Please see relevant attachment to this letter and appropriate links later in this reply.      Q 3. Minutes of any meetings the Minister has had with professionals in the health and LGBT fields, since receiving this new information, regarding their contents. A: No meetings have taken place.      Q 4. Minutes of any meetings or information that the Minister has had regarding people who have had sex with prostitutes or someone from Africa that has led to his conclusion to lift their 12 month deferral period for blood donations to a lifetime ban. A: No meetings have taken place and no information held.  Q 5. The number of meetings or conversations that the Minister has had regarding their positions and actions on MSM blood donations both before these two new pieces of evidence arose and since with his counterparts in: a) Westminster – none b) Edinburgh - none c) Cardiff – none d) Dublin – no formal meeting however Minister had a conversation with James Reilly, TD at a North/South Ministerial meeting.  Information requested in Q.2 is referred to below and a copy of a letter from Mr Reilly TD, is attached to this letter.      Q 6. Minutes of any meetings or information that the Minister has had regarding as yet undiscovered or undisclosed blood borne diseases that the Minister alluded to on 22-Sep-11. A:  No information held.

I wish to advise you that no Ministerial decision has been made as yet on the lifetime ban on blood donations by men who have had sex with men, and the position remains the same as when you were advised in a previous letter dated 15 November 2011 (FOI 140/2011 refers). Therefore Section 35 1(a) (Formulation of Government Policy) still applies.

It may be helpful if I advise that Section 35 is a qualified exemption, and we are required to assess as objectively as possible whether the balance of public interest favours disclosing or withholding information under this provision.  The Department recognises the general public interest in making this information available for the sake of greater transparency and openness.  However, final decisions have not yet been taken and the Department believes that in this instance, the public interest lies in protecting the policy-making process, and preserving the ability of officials to engage in free and candid discussion of policy options without apprehension that potential courses of action may be held up to scrutiny before they have been fully developed or evaluated.  A copy of the applied Public Interest Test is appended to this letter.

We can however release some information pertaining to your request and to which the Minister referred in a recent interview for the Sunday Politics show, broadcasted on the 17^th June 2012.  These are:

1.      Copy of a letter dated 31 May 2012 from Dr James Reilly T.D. Minister for Health (ROI)

2.      Link to the technical memorandum outlining the results of the study by the Council of Europe

Here is the text of the meat of that letter from the Irish Minister for Health:

The Irish Blood Transfusion Service (IBTS) remit is to provide a safe, reliable and  robust blood service to the Irish health system. Blood, and the products derived from it, are an integral part of healthcare delivery. A major objective of the organisation is to ensure that is always has the necessary programmes and procedures in place to protect both the donors of bl;ood and the recipients of blood and blood products.

 The IBTS has the responsibility to ensure that there is a sufficient supply of safe blood to meet the needs of patients.  In order to supply blood for transfusion all decisions on donation criteria are based on a review of the evidence bearing in mind the desire of individuals, the safety of the recipient, and the tolerance of society in general of any transfusion infection occurring. The exclusion of men who have/or had sex with other men (MSM) from donation is based not only on risk factors from HIV but on other blood borne agents known to be associated with MSM behaviour.

For Ireland, the view of IBTS, is that taking all of these aspects into account, a permanent deferral for men with a history of MSM behaviour should remain in place. This and donor deferral policy in general will be kept under constant review.

So I am somewhat bemused that once again the Minister appears to have announced that he has come to a decision, yet the Department are saying that he has yet to come to one. However, I am grateful that the Department have realised that the public interest in how he has come about his own (if not the department's decision) deems a necessity to have some form of response.

It appears that the Minister has had no meeting with Health Care professionals about the decision comments he has made. He also appears not to have talked to or consulted with the other UK health ministers but has had a brief conversation which led to the above letter with the Republic of Ireland minister. This appears to match the NI Health Minister's earlier utterances about other blood borne infection. But the SaBTO report took those into consideration in its findings.

First up look at the proportion of new diagnosis by groups

Taken from the SaBTO report April 2011

Then consider the incubation and detection periods:

• HBV - 4-6 weeks
• HCV - 50-60 days
• HIV - 1 to 4 weeks (9 day window period 99.9% accurate)

Currently all the tests above ask you to come back after 6 months if you feel you have been exposed to infection to check whether there is infection or not. Of course the new occurence of new HIV infection are out of proportion with the size of that population but look at the rest of the breakdown; fairly in proportion. Then look at some of the detail in that report.

MSM who have Hep C are usually co-diagnosed with HIV which has a shorter window period, indeed the figure is as high as 96%. Hep B new detection is prevalent among migrants from high endemicity indeed this figure also occurs in 96% of cases, so there is some credence to the Minister's earlier comments about people coming from African countries where Hep B epidemic levels exist. So the chances of anyone having any of those infections after a 12 month deferral period is small to impossible and indeed the chance of MSM slipping through the hoop is even less due to concurrency of the majority of Hep C infection with HIV detection.

Also as I have mentioned before MSM, or indeed anyone who visits a GUM clinic, who have regular blood tests are offered a course of Hep B & C inoculation so those who look after themselves are even less likely to have the other infections. Yet this behaviour is not taken into consideration with the ban in place. Nor the fact that those sexually active who have their blood regularly checked are also included in the blanket ban.

The evidence from the SaBTO report has been enough to convince England, Wales and Scotland that a 12 month deferral period is the best option as non-compliance is more likely to happen if MSM have a lifetime ban. But Northern Ireland's health minister appears not to have discussed this issue with any of his counterparts. He is however, happy to take his advice from the IBTS whose quantitative .

FOI Request on MSM Blood Ban - Part Two

Strangely it is almost 9 months since I first sent a Freedom of Information request on this issue. I received two responses the first telling me that the Department of Health, Social Services and Pensions would not be able to respond to me within the required deadline. The second that as the Minister had yet to made a decision on the issue that they could not disclose any information to me at that point.

Well it appears that for the second time, the first is here, Edwin Poots has made a decision.

Therefore it was time to raise a new request both because my deadline for comeback to the previous response had passed and because there was new Information that needed to be requested.

Here is my new request:

 Retention of MSM Lifetime Blood Ban

Dear Department of Health, Social Services and Public Safety
(Northern Ireland),

Further to my previous request, your ref FOI 2011/140

I understand that the Minster has now come to a decision which your
previous response, of 15 November, told me you could not disclose
information until he had come to one.

Therefore I'm writing to you under the Freedom of Information Act
2000 requesting:

1. For minutes of any meetings that the Minister has had pertaining
to the SaBTO report "Donation selection criteria review - men who
have had sex with men" 8-Sep-11

2. For details of any information that the Minister has received
that conflicts with or supports the quantitative and qualitative
substance of the above report. Especially that of the two pieces of
the evidence that the Minister announced on 17-Jun-12 that he had
received in recent weeks.

3. Minutes of any meetings the Minister has had with professionals
in the health and LGBT fields, since receiving this new
information, regarding their contents.

4. Minutes of any meetings or information that the Minister has had
regarding people who have had sex with prostitutes or someone from
Africa that has led to his conclusion to lift their 12 month
deferral period for blood donations to a lifetime ban.

5. The number of meetings or conversations that the Minister has
had regarding their positions and actions on MSM blood donations
with his counterparts in:
a) Westminster
b) Edinburgh
c) Cardiff
d) Dublin
both before these two new pieces of evidence arose and since.

6. Minutes of any meetings or information that the Minister has had
regarding as yet undiscovered or undisclosed blood borne diseases
that the Minister alluded to on 22-Sep-11.

Yours faithfully,

Stephen Glenn

I look forward to finding out how information received in the last couple of weeks can be so startling that it makes up the Minister's mind that has been contemplating SaBTO's very thorough report for over 9 months so rapidly. Not just for my sake but for all the men who have had sex with other men.

Redacting Worse than the Truth

There are certain things that I can accept should have been redacted with the publications of MPs expenses:

• The personal details of staff members, their addresses, bank details etc
• I'd also by the same score accept account details of the MPs themselves for their banks and services.
• Signatures also as this could lead to fraud. Although I did notice Michael Connarty's familiar looping Y was always peaking out from under this redactions.

However, there appears to be a lot that has been left out.

• The names and locations of where things were purchased.
• The detailing of what is on the receipt. I know that one of the new measures is that receipts are required for every amount claimed (welcome to the world the rest of us inhabit) but surely this could be shown now.

Some of the mysterious thing from my perusal of just a few was the number of overdue bills just from the West Lothian members. TV licenses had expired, Council Tax was not paid on time, phone bills, electric etc, other services related to accommodation were not paid on time. In this modern age most of these can be set up as direct debit payments and you never worry about the time that is being paid or that it hasn't been being paid. I accept that being a elected representative is time consuming matter but some simple steps could make things easier.

Also in the letter from Connarty to Devine detailing the £4000 sale of furniture at the top of the letter after Dear there is a redact over the name. It looks about the length to be Jim but obviously it must not be as this is the only part of the body of the text that is redacted. Maybe Michael has a pet name for Jim....slim, or sexy, or love...eugh.....sorry back to reality and that is the reason that it was black inked.

Whoever took it upon themselves to redact so much of these thousands of pages of claims has does a disservice to the phrase transparent Government. Indeed it reminds me of Sir Humphrey Littleton in the 'Open Government' episode of Yes Minister it is just the sort of compromise that he would have got Jim Hacker to agree to, nay suggest, in the closing scene should be the Department of Administrative Affairs approach to releasing MP's expenses.

Nats Want Freedom: Just Not Their Information

The double standards for the SNP have come to light again this time over the Freedom of Information.

Last month they were up in arms with Jack Straw about the UK Government's failure to release Cabinet papers in the run up to the Iraq war. However, when the Scotsman asked them to release the minutes of the Cabinet meeting on 10 February when the Cabinet decided to drop plans to ditch replacing Council Tax with LIT, nothing.

Taking Angus Robertson's words from last month.

"The public feels it was lied to about the reasons for going to war in Iraq, and those responsible must not be allowed to hide from an inquiry.

"This Cabinet cover up is typical of the Labour government’s attitude to freedom of information.

"....Those responsible have never answered the most fundamental questions about why we were led into this war.

"The claim that the war was about weapons of mass destruction was a lie, a mere cover story unsupported by the facts, which has cost the lives of thousands of civilians and hundreds of our brave soldiers"

With a slight adjustment we can ask.

"The public feels it was lied to about the reasons for breaking this policy
pledged in 2007, and those responsible must not be allowed to hide from an
inquiry.

"This Cabinet cover up is typical of the SNP government’s attitude to freedom of information and the Scottish electorate.

"Those responsible have never answered the most fundamental questions about
why we were led away from this policy that they still protected staunchly weeks
before.

"The claim that the recession makes it impossible to bring about a fairer tax for the less well off is a lie, a mere cover story unsupported by the facts, which has cost thousands of pounds needlessly to those less able to pay the unfair council tax."

Update: I see that Jeff has taken the contrary view which I find discouraging for a supporter of a party that only wants Open Government (to quote the Jim Hacker plan on this issue) on things that suit itself. It is not a case of either or. If you want to utilise FoI legislation for gaining info you have to also be prepared to tender information when requested.

I suspect that the Scotsman already know what happened in those cabinet meetings and are merely wanting to get the official minute before publication. A dangerous game for the Nats to play.

But Gord Will Back Down

Success. Well done all.

The decision to revoke an earlier decision to publish MPs expenses which the Government then backtracked on is now back on track. Gordon Brown surprised many when backed down during PMQs saying he would no longer be seeking to give MPs such an exemption under Freedom of Information.

The activities Unlock Democracy, enoughsenough.com and my society launched mobilising social networks within hours were key in getting people involved and applying pressure. Things like the Twitter hashtag #MPexpenses, Facebook Groups and other means certainly got the word out quickly and many people seemed to be contacting their MPs to sign Jo Swinson's Early Day Motion, or to vote or speak against this proposal. Apparently many MPs were inundated with letters as the people spoke.

Maybe we truly are heading to an Internet age where if we do not carry out referendae on every piece of legislation the people can at least express their views in issues which detract from the fundamentals of freedom and trust. The public can and must keep holding their parliament to account, after all MPs are only at Westminster by the grace of the electorate.

(On a personal note I just wasted my lunch period starting to write a piece up about this before checking my Tweets, for one I'm glad to spike some copy.)