The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has announced that it will axe its long-standing ban barring gay and bisexual men from donating sperm in a landmark decision.

The current FDA ban, established in response to the HIV/AIDS epidemic of the 1980s and 1990s, bars men who have sex with men from donating sperm anonymously if they’ve had sexual contact with another man in the last five years.

However, the FDA revealed recently that they hope to scrap the current ban in favour of an in-depth screening process to assess a donor’s risk of carrying HIV or other infections.

Should the ban be lifted, the number of anonymous sperm donors would increase for those seeking IVF treatment. The FDA hopes that lifting the ban will similarly lead to the lifting of similar bans on gay and bisexual men donating other tissues, such as blood.

The Wall Street Journal announced the news last night in an exclusive report wherein the FDA informed that it was hoping to finalize its proposal to lift the ban by this summer.

The proposal will then travel to the White House and, if approved, the ban could be lifted by the end of 2024.

The news comes as IVF has become a more popular option than ever before for women in the United States. 86,000 babies were reportedly born as a result of IVF treatment in the US in 2021, compared to 53,000 in 2012.

Sperm banks throughout the US have similarly been reporting a shortage in the number of samples available for patients.

While the questions that will be asked on the proposed questionnaire have yet to be revealed, the guidelines will likely follow those required for gay and bisexual men to donate blood, which currently require GBMSM to have not had any new sexual partners in the last three months in order to donate.

The questionnaire will be coupled with already rigorous precautions for the prevention of HIV transmission between sperm donors and patients.