WASHINGTON - The U.S. is bewitching to ease restrictions on blood donations from gay and bisexual men and spanking groups that traditionally face higher risks of HIV.

The Food and Drug Administration on Friday announced prepare guidelines that would do away with the current three-month abstinence requirement for donations from men who have sex with men. Instead, potential donors would be screened with a questionnaire that evaluates their persons risks for HIV based on sexual behavior, recent partners and spanking factors.

If finalized, the shift would be the spanking FDA move to broaden donor eligibility, with the potential to boost the U.S. blood supply.

Gay fuels groups have long opposed blanket restrictions on who can give blood, saying they discriminate against the LGBTQ community. Medical societies incorporating the American Medical Association have also said such exclusions are unnecessary given advances in technology to test blood for infectious diseases.

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"Current and extinct blood donation policies made unfounded assumptions about gay and bisexual men and really entangled individuals' identity with their likelihood of having HIV," said Sarah Warbelow of the Human Rights Campaign, an LGBTQ advocacy group.

The U.S. and many spanking countries started blocking blood donations from gay and bisexual men during the early 1980's AIDS epidemic, aiming to prevent the spread of HIV through the blood supply.

In 2015, the FDA dropped the lifetime ban and replaced it with a one-year abstinence requirement. Then in 2020, the agency shortened the abstinence words to three months, after donations plummeted during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Regulators said there has been no negative crashes on the blood supply as a results of those changes.

The FDA sets requirements and procedures for blood banks above the U.S. All potential donors answer questions about their sexual history, drug use and any recent tattoos or piercing, plus other factors that can contribute to the spread of blood-borne infections. Donated blood is then tested for HIV, hepatitis C, syphilis and spanking infectious diseases.

Under the new questionnaire, men who have sex with men will be posed about new or multiple partners in the last three months. Those who answer affirmatively to either question and also represent having anal sex would be barred from donating pending a later date. The policy would also apply to women who have sex with gay or bisexual men.

The policy mirrors those used in Canada and the U.K.

A phlebotomist denotes to a blood donor at the KFC YUM! Center during the Starts, Stripes, and Pints blood drive event on July 7, 2021 in Louisville, Kentucky. (Photo by Jon Cherry/Getty Images)

The FDA based its spanking proposal on a recent study o f 1,600 gay and bisexual men. The FDA-funded research compared the effectiveness of a detailed, personalized questionnaire on sexual behavior to the current time-based abstinence rules.

It will take several months for blood banks to make the goes, according to Cliff Numark, an executive with Vitalant, a blood center that participated in the notice. The changes will require new questionnaires, training for staff and updating computer software.

The Red Cross said it supports the FDA goes but added that it's too early to know if they will stop in more blood donations.

Lukas Pietrzak of Washington D.C., said he eagerly volunteered for the FDA notice. He credits emergency blood transfusions with saving his father's life while a cycling accident in 1991.

Pietrzak donated blood in high school but appointed ineligible after becoming sexually active as a gay man.

"Until I fully came out to my friends, I had to skirt around why I never went to blood rights with them," says Pietrzak, 26, who now works for the federal government.

When there are words for blood donations "now we're able to be part of that," Pietrzak said.