Canada: Canadian Report highlights a "clear pattern of racism" in media reporting of HIV-related offences

Media accused of racism in reporting HIV-related crime

Black males with HIV account for 20 per cent of the 181 people charged for no disclosing HIV status to sexual partners, but 62 per cent of newspaper articles focused on their cases.

Canadian mainstream media disproportionally focus on black immigrant men criminally charged for not disclosing HIV status to their sexual partners when the majority of offenders are white, says a new study.

To mark World AIDS Day on Wednesday, a team of Canadian researchers released the pioneering study last week identifying “a clear pattern of racism” toward black men in the reporting of HIV non-disclosure in Canadian newspapers.

“The most striking revelation of this report was the grand scale of stereotyping and stigmatizing by Canadian media outlets in their sensationalistic coverage of HIV non-disclosure cases,” said Eric Mykhalovskiy, a York University sociology professor, who leads the team.

“It’s upsetting to read myths masquerading as news and repeating the theme of how black men living with HIV are hypersexual dangerous ‘others.’ This approach not only demeans journalism, but it inflames racism and HIV stigmatization, undermining educational and treatment efforts.”

Based on the database of Factiva, an English-language Canadian newspaper articles from 1989 to 2015, researchers from York, University of Toronto and Lakehead University identified 1,680 reports of HIV non-disclosure cases. Of those reports 68 per cent, or 1,141 of the articles, focused on racialized defendants.

According to court records of HIV-related criminal cases in Canada, African, Caribbean and black men living with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, account for 20 per cent or 36 of the 181 people charged for these offenses. However, 62 per cent or 1,049 of the 1,680 media reports focused on these 20 per cent of the cases.

Immigrants and refugees receive particularly higher amount of coverage. While only 32 of the 181 accused are known to be migrants to Canada, yet stories about their offences represented 62 per cent (1,046 of 1,680) of the media coverage.

“The report documents the media’s stigmatizing and unjust racial profiling of black heterosexual immigrant men in HIV non-disclosure cases that perpetuates systematic discrimination,” said Christian Hui, an HIV activist and co-founder of the Canadian Positive People Network.

“We know next to nothing about them other than their name, age, residence, occupation, the charges they face,” said the report. “What is distinct about the coverage of African, Caribbean and black male defendants is how (they) are linked with racializing forms of representation in ways that amplify connections between HIV, criminality, race and ‘foreignness.’”

Mykhalovskiy said the research team recognized that accused criminals often refuse to speak with the media at their counsel’s advice, but it does not change the fact black immigrant offenders are disproportionally represented in the coverage.

The study urges the Canadian media to treat HIV non-disclosure as a health issue and not simply a crime story; to stop using mug shots that further stigmatizing and discriminate people with HIV as criminals; and to reach out to AIDS service organizations when interviewing sources for these stories.

Published in The Star, on Dec 1, 2016

US: Broad coalition takes on Missouri's outdated and stigmatizing HIV criminal laws

JEFFERSON CITY — December 1st was World Aids Day and Missouri activists want legislators to change a law concerning those living with HIV.

Right now, in the state of Missouri, any person who exposes someone to HIV could go to prison. If a person contracts HIV the person who gave it to them could go to prison for life. This law has put 82 people in prison since 1997. Activists explain this law is discriminatory and based on outdated science.

Activists on November 30th launched the Missouri HIV Justice Coalition. The group plans to lobby policy makers to repeal the law.

Empower Missouri Executive Director Jeanette Mott Oxford said the laws should be based on accurate science.

She said the current law makes assumptions about HIV transmission that we now know are incorrect.

“We hope that Missouri will modernize their law making it medically accurate and taking away the stigma of people with HIV by taking the HIV specific part out of our criminal code… certainly there should be laws about doing things such as biting people, but you shouldn’t have a higher penalty for being a person with HIV.”

“About 2/3rds of the United States have “HIV-specific” statues that result in prosecutions of those living with HIV for having sexual contact without being able to prove they disclosed their HIV positive status in advance,” according to activist group The Sero Project.

Senator Rob Schaaf, R-St. Joseph, said he could see the laws changing in the future.

“The law is based upon a false premise,” Sen. Schaaf said. “I doubt that there’s a big urgency in changing it, but I think it would eventually be changed to fit our understanding of the true situation.”

Mott Oxford said the Missouri HIV Justice Coalition plans to hold upcoming events to educate more people about the current law. If you are interested in joining the group, you can contact Mott Oxford at Empower Missouri at (573)-634-2901.

Currently there is no legislation to repeal this law.

Published on KCRG TV on Dec 1, 2016

Uganda: 5 months after filing their initial petition, activists renew their call to amend HIV law

Activists renew call for HIV law amendment

By Noah Jagwe

They argue that the law contains clauses that could deter all the benefits in the fight against the scourge.

According to this group, the law instead instills fear in communities about HIV disclosure and also fuels stigmatization.

Earlier this year, some 60 civil society organizations across the country challenged the criminalization of HIVin Uganda as well as other ‘harmful’ provisions in the Act.

Dora Kichoncho Musinguzi, the executive director Uganda Network on Law and Ethics, said the salient features that are scanned out in the law which they consider discriminatory are: Clauses 21, 41 and 43 of the Act that seek to criminalize HIV, particularly intentional transmission.

The Act would require mandatory disclosure of one’s HIV status, failure of which would be regarded as “criminal”, and attempting to or, intentionally transmitting the virus.

Failure to use a condom where one knows their HIV status would constitute a criminal offence, making them liable for prosecution.

The provisions in the HIV Act, according to Kichonco, do not only stigmatize and discriminate against people living with HIV, but also deter communities from seeking HIV services such as HIV testing and subsequently HIV treatment.

“It is five months since we filed the petition. The government has not responded to our case. This is procedurally wrong and negates justice,” she said.

Kichoncho said if the law continues “as we could see”, it would heighten stigmatization of people living with HIV and that many of the targets such as 90% of people knowing their status, 90% of those who with HIV are on treatment and 90% with suppressed  viral load set by the country might not be achieved.

“The law has been counterproductive to all the achievements Uganda has made.”

She said the legal environment in Uganda is not conducive and human rights have not been respected. “Laws that criminalize and stigmatize people with HIV must be repealed.”

Meanwhile, Dorothy Nassolo, communications officer of Forum of People Living with HIV/Aids Networks in Uganda said there is a crisis the country might not stand.

She said a number of patients have been hacked to death because they have been discovered by their spouses for taking ARVs covertly.

National Forum of People Living with HIV/AIDS officer Milly Katana said the most affected group by the law are women through gender-based violence at home.

Katana said it’s better for Uganda to look at other alternatives for instance biomedical tools, medical male circumcision and condoms. –

Published in New Vision on Dec 1, 2016

US: Sero Project releases new short film to raise awareness of the criminalization of people living with HIV

SERO PROJECT RELEASES NEW SHORT FILM ON HIV CRIMINALIZATION

(November 28, 2016) In conjunction with World AIDS Day on December 1, the SERO Project announced the release of its new documentary short film, HIV Criminalization: Masking Fear and Discrimination. The short film furthers SERO Project’s goal .

 “As HIV activists, HIV criminalization is a defining moral issue of our time,” said SERO Project executive director Sean Strub. “State statutes throughout the country that prosecute people based solely on their viral status pose a serious threat to both public health and individual civil liberties. Masking Fear and Discrimination serves as a primer on the topic of HIV criminalization, particularly for those who are new to this growing concern.For advocates and health professionals in the field, it is essential viewing.”

 Masking Fear and Discrimination is directed by filmmaker Christopher King and produced by HIV writer Mark S. King. It was made possible through the support of the H. van Ameringen Foundation, Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS, the Elton John AIDS Foundation, and the Gill Foundation.

The short film features Cecilia Chung, SERO’s board chair and senior strategist at the Transgender Law Center (San Francisco, CA), Venita Ray, attorney and advocate at Legacy Community Health Services (Houston, TX), Anthony Mills, MD (Los Angeles, CA), and Justin Rush, director of public policy at the True Colors Fund and formerly a manager of policy and legislative affairs at the National Alliance of State and Territorial AIDS Directors (Washington, DC).

 In addition, people living with HIV who have been prosecuted for “HIV crimes” are interviewed in the film, including Robert Suttle, SERO’s assistant director (New York, NY), LTC Kenneth Pinkela, a consultant to Sero’s Military HIV Policy Project (Otisville, PA), Monique Moree (South Carolina), Mark Hunter (Grambling, LA), Kerry Thomas (Boise, ID), Donald Bogardus (Waterloo, IA) and Edward Casto (Spokane, WA).

 “I am inspired by the courage of those who have been prosecuted to step forward and become advocates for change,” said Tami Haught, SERO’s director of state organizing. “Their first-hand testimonials have brought this issue to the attention of advocates and the public and are why we have made progress towards ending HIV criminalization in recent years.”

 The release of the documentary coincides with the launch of a newly designed SERO Project website, which provides information on criminalization, including a helpful State-by-State guide and resources for people with HIV who are concerned about or threatened with prosecution. The site also features videos from the HIV Is Not a Crime national conference on HIV criminalization (produced by SERO and the Positive Women’s Network-USA), interviews with people living with HIV who have faced criminal charges, and testimony concerning HIV criminalization at conferences and meetings.

 HIV Criminalization: Masking Fear and Discrimination can be viewed on SERO Project site, at www.seroproject.com, or via YouTube at HIV Criminalization: Masking Fear and Discrimination.

 SERO is a U.S.-based network of people living with HIV and allies fighting for freedom from stigma and injustice. SERO is particularly focused on ending inappropriate criminal prosecutions of people with HIV, including for non-disclosure of their HIV status, potential or perceived HIV exposure or HIV transmission.

 For more information on the SERO Project please visit www.seroproject.com.  For interviews with SERO staff, or a person living with HIV who has been subjected to HIV criminalization, please contact Ken Pinkela, listed above.

HIV Criminalization: Masking Fear and Discrimination (Sero, US, 2016)

A short documentary for the Sero Project produced by Mark S King, written by Christopher King, and edited by Andrew Seger.

Canada: New report explores mainstream Canadian newspaper coverage of HIV non-disclosure criminal cases, highlighting stigmatizing representations of African, Caribbean and Black men living with HIV

Abstract:

This report explores mainstream Canadian newspaper coverage of HIV non-disclosure criminal cases in Canada. It pays particular attention to how defendants’ race and immigration status figure into the newspaper representations of such cases. We empirically enquire into claims that African, Caribbean and Black (ACB) people living with HIV are negatively portrayed and overrepresented in Canadian newspaper stories about HIV non-disclosure cases. Our analysis is based on what, to our knowledge, is the largest data set of news coverage of the issue: a corpus of 1680 English-language Canadian newspaper articles about HIV non-disclosure criminal cases in Canada written between 1 January 1989 and 31 December 2015. Our quantitative and qualitative findings show that Canadian mainstream newspapers are a source of profoundly stigmatizing representations of ACB men living with HIV. For example, Black immigrant men living with HIV are dramatically overemphasized in Canadian mainstream newspaper stories about such cases. While these men account for only 15% of defendants charged they are the focus of 61% of newspaper coverage. Mainstream newspapers rely on forms of language that transfer a long history of exaggerated connections between criminality, race, sex, and otherness to the site of HIV. The result is that ACB men living with HIV are repeatedly represented as dangerous, hypersexual, foreigners who pose a threat to the health and safety of individuals (White women) and, more broadly, the imagined Canadian nation.
The report is available to download here

 

Australia: Delegates at Australia’s national HIV/AIDS conference condemn antiscientific laws mandating HIV testing for people accused of spitting at police officers

Media Release

Adelaide: Friday, 18 November 2016

Delegates at Australia’s national HIV/AIDS conference have condemned the governments of South Australia, Western Australia and Northern Territory over laws that force people accused of criminal offences to undergo mandatory HIV and blood-borne virus testing.

The conference passed a resolution this afternoon expressing its ‘profound disappointment’ in the laws, which make it mandatory for people to undergo blood tests if they are accused of spitting on or biting law enforcement personnel. The laws were passed in South Australia and Western Australia in 2014, and in the Northern Territory in 2016.

Australia has a proud record of basing its HIV response on evidence-based policy,” said Adjunct Associate Professor Levinia Crooks CEO of the Australasian Society for HIV, Viral Hepatitis and Sexual Health Medicine (ASHM). “These laws are antiscientific — the risk of transmission of HIV or other blood-borne viruses from saliva is practically zero. There is no justification for invading the privacy of people in custody by forcing them to undergo blood tests when there is no risk to the officer.”

“We understand the considerable risks faced by police and emergency services when they go about their jobs, but this is not the solution. There has never been a case of HIV transmission from spitting or biting in Australia.”

The full text of the resolution passed by the conference is:

As researchers, clinicians, and civil society representatives, we are united in our commitment to a HIV response grounded in evidence and protective of the human rights of people living with and affected by HIV. This conference expresses its profound disappointment in the governments of South Australia, Western Australia and the Northern Territory for enacting anti scientific and counterproductive laws mandating HIV testing for people accused of spitting on law enforcement personnel, in the face of overwhelming evidence that such laws are neither effective nor necessary. HIV is not transmitted in saliva and these laws only serve to further marginalise and criminalise people with HIV. We call on all governments to establish evidence-based protocols that protect the wellbeing of police and emergency workers and the rights of people living with HIV.

The Australasian HIV & AIDS Conference is the premier medical/scientific conference in the Australasian HIV and related diseases sector. The 2016 Conference was held in Adelaide from 16–18 November, in conjunction with the Australasian Sexual Health Conference.

For all media enquires, please contact:

Media Contact:  Petrana Lorenz — 0405 158 636  |  petrana@arkcommunications.com.au

Czech Republic: Police drop charges against all 30 gay men living with HIV following Prague Public Health Authority ‘witch hunt’

All criminal charges have been dropped against the 30 gay men living with HIV who were reported to the police by the Prague Public Health Authority earlier this year after they were diagnosed with an STI, Czech media report today.

The draconian behaviour of Prague Public Health led to widespread condemnation by human rights defenders.

A change.org petition initated by the European AIDS Treament Group (EATG) was signed by more than 1000 supporters, including the HIV Justice Network.

Today’s media report in Aktuálně.cz notes that three of the 30 men had been indicted for potential HIV transmission (under a law criminalising ‘the spread of infectious human diseases‘) but prosecutorial authorities withdrew the charges due to lack of evidence.

Police spokesman, Jan Danek, told the paper that following an investigation there was no case to prove against any of the 30 men and all charges had been dropped.

Canada: HIV activists form national coalition to lobby for an end to the criminalisation of people living with HIV

HIV activists form Canadian coalition to fight criminalization

Aggravated sexual assault convictions for HIV non-disclosure are unjust, members say.

A group of HIV activists, lawyers, and service providers from across Canada have formed a national coalition to call for an end to the criminalization of people living with HIV.

The Canadian Coalition to Reform HIV Criminalization, years in the making, will lobby nationally for people who have been charged for not disclosing their HIV status. Up until now, this work was only done locally and provincially, and mostly by lawyers rather than people most affected by the law.

“We have an amazing expert community of lawyers working on this issue,” says Alexander McClelland, a Montreal-based HIV criminalization researcher and member of the coalition. “But lawyers talk to other lawyers and haven’t been engaged more broadly. So hopefully we can shift things with the way the coalition is organized. We’re really centrally placing lived experience of people on our steering committee.”

Under Canadian law, a person living with HIV must disclose their status to anal and vaginal sexual partners or face the charge of aggravated sexual assault, which carries a maximum lifetime sentence and registry as a sex offender. This standard was most recently upheld in a 2012 Supreme Court of Canada ruling based on outdated science. The court ruled that to be considered safe enough not to disclose, HIV carriers must have very low viral load and wear condoms. Research now shows, however, that low viral load itself is enough to be nearly perfectly safe.

Coalition members met in October after many attended the HIV Is Not A Crime 2 Training Academy in Huntsville Alabama. Realizing the national level of organization in the United States led by people who have been charged and convicted, the attendees realized Canada needed something similar.

The coalition wants to limit prosecutions to intentional transmissions of HIV. Of over 180 known HIV prosecutions in Canada since the discovery of the virus as the cause of AIDS, there have been just two known intentional transmissions, according to Cecile Kazatchkine, senior policy analyst with the Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network.

The large percentage of unjust prosecutions in Canada, she says, has a chilling effect on people living with the virus.

“Many [HIV positive] people fear being prosecuted, of that happening to them at some point, like an old partner coming back to them and saying things that may not be true but it’s one word against another.”

The law is constructed to protect the sexual autonomy of women, Kazatchkine says, but it can often have the opposite effect on many HIV-positive women living in abusive relationships who fear their partners could use their status against them if they tried to leave.

“There’s a climate of fear and uncertainty that guides everything that we do and so it would be great to intervene in that and change the current situation,” adds McClelland, who lives with HIV.

Though still in its early stages, the coalition is concentrating on three areas: involving the lived experiences of those who live with the virus and have been criminally charged, lobbying provincial and federal politicians to change the Criminal Code and how it is enforced, and publicizing unjust prosecutions.

The group is also working on specific demands for the federal government, which writes the criminal law, and for provincial governments, which administer the law through the courts.

McClelland says coalition members have spoken to Minister of Justice Jody Wilson-Raybould, which he finds promising, since no such meeting took place under the previous Conservative government.

“It’s also really, really hard to get the Criminal Code reformed,” he notes, “but if we can appeal to members of parliament that it’s being applied so unjustly, then potentially there’s an option for that.”

Published in DailyXtra on Nov 14, 2016