France will end a ban tomorrow (March 16) that rules that gay men cannot give blood if they have had sexual relations in the past four months. The update to the law was voted through last summer, and published in the country’s official journal on January 13 this year. French Health Minister Olivier Véran welcomed the change, saying, “we are ending an inequality that was no longer justified”. The new ruling has been a long time in the making. Homosexual men were banned from giving blood in France in 1983 due to the AIDS epidemic. This ban was lifted in 2016, but on the condition that they had not had sex in the past 12 months. In 2019, this was shortened to four months. Tomorrow, the question about sexual relations with a man will be entirely removed from the blood donation criteria questionaire. In the UK, men who have had sex with the same man for three months or more can give blood. Anyone who has had sex with a new partner or multiple partners in the past three months, regardless of their gender, must wait three months before donating.