During the eighties, The HIV crisis created a national panic about the safety of the nation’s blood supply, and gay men were stigmatized as the source of the disease. By 1992, the FDA had placed a lifetime ban on blood donations from men who'd had even a single sexual encounter with another man since 1977. Despite significant advances in HIV detection, that rule wasn't lifted until 2015. BUT it was replaced by another prohibitive restriction requiring men to abstain from sexual contact with other men for a full year before they could donate blood. Subscribe to VICE News here: http://bit.ly/Subscribe-to-VICE-News Check out VICE News for more: http://vicenews.com/ Follow VICE News here: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/vicenews Twitter: https://twitter.com/vicenews Tumblr: http://vicenews.tumblr.com/ Instagram: http://instagram.com/vicenews More videos from the VICE network: https://www.fb.com/vicevideo