The Guidance on Good Practices in HIV Decriminalisation is the first global resource to identify what effective, rights-based HIV decriminalisation looks like in practice.
Developed by the HIV Justice Network with support from UNAIDS, it brings together contemporary HIV science, international human rights standards, criminal law principles, public health evidence, and more than three decades of community leadership and advocacy. Rather than proposing a single model for reform, it distils lessons from countries and jurisdictions that have successfully prevented, limited, reformed or repealed HIV criminalisation laws and practices.
The Guidance demonstrates how punitive approaches to HIV undermine public health, human rights and justice, while identifying practical approaches that support legal and policy reform in diverse political, legal and social contexts. Throughout, it recognises the central role of people living with HIV and their communities, alongside advocates, scientists, lawyers, judges, policymakers and public health practitioners, in achieving lasting change.
Drawing on the HIV Justice Network’s Global HIV Criminalisation Database, international legal and scientific developments, and decades of advocacy experience from around the world, the Guidance combines practical recommendations with case studies, examples of good practice and tools that can be adapted by governments, civil society organisations, community networks, UN agencies, donors and others working to end HIV criminalisation.