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Comment by j_timberlake | Hacker News Reader

The dark truth is that the kind of people who are desperate for that money are also much more likely to have tainted blood from illegal drugs, dirty needles, and STDs.

The bureaucracy plays it safe by just banning payment, even though people like James aren't in that risk category.

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But every country that bans payment turns around and buys plasma from countries that don’t. So it doesn’t make their plasma supply one bit safer. All it does is make plasma-derived products rarer and more expensive.

Might be a demographic difference that explains it. I donated materials when I was a broke college student, wouldn't surprise me if the bulk came from people in similar situations

This is correct, and is also true for healthy volunteers in clinical trials. I did them when I was a young broke college student, 100% of the healthy volunteers were where what I would consider to be quite poor.

The US already has plasma 'donation' clinics that pay you per donation. It just doesn't exist for blood.

I made an extra $100/mo that way in uni and it paid for a lot of beer (or 1/5th of a uni textbook).

My understanding is all of these cases are tested for. A lifelong blood donor could still get XYZ after donating for 10 years.

Now if you are talking about undetectable or uncommon I could understand, but that just shows a fault in the testing process.

It's been a while since I last donated blood, but last time I checked some conditions are hard to reliably check for especially in the earlier stages. For example, if I remember correct HIV is hard to reliably detect for the first ~6 months or so, as is Hepatitis B and some other conditions.

This is why you get a questionary every time asking whether you had unprotected sex, recently had a tattoo, etc.

Those tests are faster now, however what remains entirely untested is simple sickness like colds. That's why you're supposed to call them if you get a cold within a few days of donating, they have no other way of knowing.

As others have said, all countries pay. There are ways we could compensate people for the fair market value of their blood that would be resistant to abuse and risky donors. Paid vacation seems to be a good option, or a refundable tax credit that that's not realized for a year.

Better to import it from poorer countries right? Or would you wanna make it illegal to import it too which would result in many dead people?

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