A Movement to Reform State Laws

It seems the movement to reform state laws about HIV exposure -- you know, the laws that turn people with HIV into felons if they spit on the wrong people -- continues to pick up steam. Provincetown's Edge newspaper just published an interesting story on the subject. It highlights some of the more egregious prosecutions we've seen in recent years:

Among the most extreme examples of prosecutions ... are a Texas man with HIV who received a 35-year prison sentence for spitting at a police officer and an Iowa man with an undetectable viral load who was sentenced to 25 years after a one-time sexual encounter where he used a condom. Another man with HIV in Michigan was charged under the state’s "bioterrorism" law after he allegedly bit his neighbor.

It also quotes several legal advocates around the nation who are working to reverse this trend:

Alison Yager, a supervising attorney with the HIV Law Project in New York, told EDGE that HIV exposure laws not only "abandon basic human rights, perpetuate stigma and discrimination and undermine public health goals, but in some cases, like those laws that criminalize spitting by an HIV-positive person, they ignore the science of HIV transmission."

It makes for very interesting reading. Check it out here.