In the fall of 2009, researchers at a lab in Reno, Nevada, said they detected a potentially transmissible virus in the blood of people with myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME). The study led the American Red Cross to ban blood donations from people with ME. The study was retracted in 2011 and the Red Cross guideline was later reversed, but more than a decade later, there is still a lifetime ban on blood donation from people with ME in the U.K. by the National Health Service (NHS). Similar ME donor bans are also active today in Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, and Canada. The Canadian Blood Service and the Australian Red Cross both state that ME could be caused by a “transmissible” infection. More questions began to emerge about blood donation by members of the chronic illness community in 2022 when the NHS updated their eligibility requirements, deferring people with Long Covid from donating blood until they considered themselves “fully recovered.” Their reasoning? They stated that blood donation could worsen the symptoms of people with Long Covid or ME.