When Liam Dee began receiving hospice care shortly after starting his nursing career, he knew the rare cancer that had ravaged his body meant his organs were too damaged to donate.
But the 26-year-old was grateful his tissues, including skin, corneas, tendons and bones, could still go to people who needed them.
However, his tissues were rejected when he died last November, said his mother Cindy Gates-Dee, who learned from reading her son’s medical records that his “homosexual status,” as noted on a screening form by a tissue specialist, meant he was declined as a high-risk donor because he’d had sex with