Blood Lines

IA recent study regarding cross-sex blood transfusions and subsequent mortality may have implications for Blanchard’s immune factor Fraternal Birth Order Effect etiology hypothesis.  In the study, they found that when blood from a previously pregnant woman is transfused in men, their subsequent mortality is increased compared to women who are transfused.  Blood from women who had never been pregnant did not increase men’s mortality.  The hypothesis is that when women are pregnant with a male child, immune factors are created against “males” that can be transfused into men and cause iatrogenic harm.  Note the similarity with the immune factor Fraternal Birth Order Effect hypothesis.

To remind my reader.  The Fraternal Birth Order Effect is the now well established fact that androphilic males (both gay and transsexual) have more older brothers than sisters.  That is to say, that the odds that a given male baby will be androphilic increases with each male child that their mother had carried previously.  This is a cumulative effect.

Further research is called for in this new case of transfusion induced mortality connection, of course.  But this suggests a new wrinkle to the immune factor hypothesis.  Could the issue of immune factor mediation for the Fraternal Birth Order Effect be one of increased fetal mortality for heterosexual males rather than immune factors interfering with virilization?  This too should be researched.  If this hypothesis is true, the mothers of gay men would have higher “chemical” pregnancies that did not become clinical pregnancies than mothers of only heterosexual men.

Further Reading:

Essay on Fraternal Birth Order Effect

“Blood Boundaries: Should Transfusions Be Matched by Sex? A new study raises questions about potential dangers” By Karen Weintraub, Scientific American (2017)

References:

Camila Caram-Deelder, Aukje L. Kreuger, Dorothea Evers, et al, “Association of Blood Transfusion From Female Donors With and Without a History of Pregnancy With Mortality Among Male and Female Transfusion Recipients” JAMA (2017)
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/article-abstract/2657377

Malvina N. Skorska, Ray Blanchard, Doug P. VanderLaan, Kenneth J. Zucker, Anthony F. Bogaert, “Gay Male Only-Children: Evidence for Low Birth Weight and High Maternal Miscarriage Rates” Archives of Sexual Behavior (2016)
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10508-016-0829-9