US: Five laws categorised as “bad” laws by the Human Rights Campaign in Missouri , including HIV/AIDS criminalisation laws

Missouri ranked in lowest category for LGBTQ protections, nondiscrimination

The Human Rights Campaign recently released their fifth annual State Equality Index — a state-by-state report detailing statewide laws and policies that affect LGBTQ people, assessing how well states are doing to protect LGBTQ individuals from discrimination.

This year, Missouri received the lowest rating, “High Priority to Achieve Basic Equality.” This rating is given to states that focus on raising suport for basic LGBTQ equality laws, such as non-discrimination laws, and for states focusing on municipal protections for LGBTQ people including opposing negative legislation.

Twenty-eight states earned this rating. Seventeen states earned the highest rating, “Working Toward Innovative Equality,” while the remaining five earned “Solidifying Equality” or “Building Equality.”

Karis Agnew, field director for PROMO, Missouri’s statewide LGBTQ advocacy organization, explained that they expected this rating for Missouri.

“It does not surprise me because there are basic protections that LGBTQ people lack in Missouri and those include protection of employment, housing and public accommodations,” Agnew said.

Missouri has a total of six laws that benefit LGBTQ people — hate crime laws, a college and universities non-discrimination law, a sexual orientation non-discrimination policy for state employees, an anti-bullying law specifically for cyberbullying, transgender inclusion in sports, and name and gender updates on identification documents for drivers licenses.

Missouri has five laws that the HRC categorizes as “bad” laws including HIV/AIDS criminalization laws, a state Religious Freedom Restoration Act, and transgender exclusions in state Medicaid coverage.

Missouri lacks all parenting laws such as parental presumption for same-sex couples, second parent adoption, and foster care non-discrimination. Missouri also lacks basic non-discrimination laws for employment, housing, public accommodation, education, adoption, foster care, insurance, credit, and jury selection.

The absence of youth laws in Missouri include anti-bullying laws, protection from conversion therapy, and laws to address LGBTQ youth homelessness. In the health and safety category, Missouri lacks laws including LGBTQ nondiscrimantion protections in Affordable Care Act exchanges, transgender healthcare coverage, and name and gender updates on identification documents for birth certificates.

Alex Padilla, co-president of Spectrum, an LGBTQ group at Missouri State Univerity, explained his fear regarding how few laws Missouri has protecting LGBTQ individuals like himself.

“Whenever I first came out, I was working at a fast food job and I was worried that I could be fired for who I was,” Padilla said.

He explained that he did a quick search online and found that there were no laws protecting him from being harassed or fired because of who he was.

Agnew, who prefers using gender-neutral pronouns, explained that although this rating is low, organizations like PROMO are working hard behind the scenes to make sure Missouri’s laws are progressing.

“When it comes to passing laws that are pro-equality, the thing that we really need the most to be able to do that is make sure that we don’t have bills that are anti-LGBTQ,” Agnew said.

Agnew explained that in 2018 five anti-LGBTQ laws were filed but PROMO worked to ensure zero made it to the governor’s desk to be signed.

“When those are filed, that is our priority, so it is really hard for us to file proactive legislation and pass proactive legislation when we have legislation that is harmful to LGBTQ people that we work so hard to prevent from passing,” Agnew said.

Agnew said a big reason why Missouri is far behind other states in passing pro-LGBTQ legislation is that Missouri legislators are not aware of what it is like to live as an LGBTQ individual.

“I think a lot of our legislators in Missouri honestly don’t know what it’s like to be LGBTQ — the majority of our legislators are not LGBTQ themselves,” Agnew said. “And because of that, I think a lot of them have a lot to learn from their constituents that are.”

Agnew said this year is the 21st year that PROMO has worked to file the Missouri Nondiscrimination Act, which would add protections for sexual orientation and gender identity in places of employment, housing and public accommodations.

“When their constituents aren’t bringing it up they assume it’s not important and not needed,” Agnew said. “The number one thing people can do is engage their elected officials and talk to them about why something like the Missouri Nondiscrimination Act is so important to them.”

Padilla explained how important it is for students to get involved.

“Help us lobby for equality, Padilla said. “Advocating for these things and showing that you are an ally is really helpful to all of Missouri and all of Missouri’s LGBTQ people.”

PROMO is hosting an “Equality Day,” a day of lobbying where people in the community come up to Jefferson City and talk to legislators about the Missouri Nondiscrimination Act on April 10.

Uganda: Mapping of the legal environment shows how the current criminal justice system discriminates against people living with HIV

Published in the Daily Monitor on Febraury 22, 2019

Report shows how laws discriminate against HIV positive people

KAMPALA- Various existing laws criminalise people living with HIV/ Aids, according to a new report released in Kampala on Thursday.

The report is titled: “Draft report on the assessment and mapping of the legal environment on provisions of HIV and TB services to let populations, persons living with HIV and tuberculosis”

“The existing legal framework is not favourable for some categories of the key, vulnerable and priority populations to freely access health services in Uganda. Specifically, the lifestyles sex workers, men who have sex with men, transgender persons and makes them most affected by the existing legal framework in Uganda,” read part of the report

It adds: “The laws criminalise sex work, same sex relationships and drug use. This results into violence, harassment, disappointment of sex workers and their legal recourse to address injustice against them.” “The other law, the HIV and Aids prevention and Control Act although not specifically targeting key vulnerable and priority populations, has implications for both the general affected by HIV in Uganda.”

The report indicates that the HIV and Aids Prevention and Control Act 2014 provides for voluntary HIV testing in Sub Section 9. However, the voluntarism is not considered if a person commits a sexual offense as part of the criminal proceedings and yet Section 8 provides for identity of a person tested with HIV not to be disclosed or released to any person except in accordance with the law and medical standards.

The report was carried out by civil society organisation Center for Health, Human Rights and Development (CEHURD) in conjunction with Aids and Rights Alliance for South Africa (ARASA).

The current criminal justice system is also discriminative as it hands down more deterrent jail terms to those suspects found to be living with HIV than their counterparts that are not.

Reacting to the aforementioned finding, a law professor at Makerere University, Prof. Ben Twinomugisha, explained that sometimes it’s prudent for the prosecution to take an HIV test of a suspect accused of committing a sexual offense for purposes of securing a conviction.

However, he was also quick to say that this compulsory HIV testing will lead to violation of their human rights and that this will drive those infected away instead of going to hospital to get medication.

“But a civil society organisation and I, have since petitioned court challenging Section 43 of the HIV Prevention and Control Act about criminalization of HIV,” Prof. Twinomugisha said

“Why is it that a person suffering from Hepatitis B, which is more deadly than HIV are not subjected to a test when they commit a crime,” he wondered.

The study was carried out in three districts of Gulu, Mbarara and Tororo.

The study was mainly about the extent to which laws and policies protect and promote the rights of persons living with HIV/ Aids, let populations like sex workers, truck drivers and fishermen can access health care and services.

The HIV prevalence in Uganda stands at 6.2%. In 2016, approximately 1.4 million people were living with HIV and 28,000 Ugandans were estimated to have died of Aids-related illness.

Travel and long-stay restrictions for foreign nationals with HIV have no logical basis and have been deemed a human rights violation by the United Nations

Published in South China Morning Post on February 5, 2019

Visa restrictions for HIV-positive immigrants still in place in dozens of countries

Recent leak in Singapore of data of HIV-positive people renewed attention on its curbs on long-term stays by those who have the virus
Countries with restrictions include Russia and the United Arab Emirates; there’s no logical basis for them any more, UNAids says

A data leak of Singaporean medical records exposing the HIV-positive status of 14,200 people last month triggered concerns about a backlash for those whose health status was made public in a country that continues to stigmatise the disease.

But the case, involving the records of 8,800 foreign nationals who tested positive for HIV in Singapore, also shines a spotlight on the city state’s restrictive policies towards foreigners with HIV, who face barriers to staying in the country for more than 90 days unless married to a Singaporean national.

The records were leaked by a foreigner in just such a situation, American Mikhy Farrera Brochez, who was deported after serving jail time for drug-related crimes and fraud, including hiding his HIV status. He was able to access the records with help from his boyfriend, a Singaporean doctor.

Singapore is one of only a handful of developed nations that still have laws restricting the long-term stay of foreign nationals with HIV – laws that have been deemed a human rights violation by the United Nations.

“When this [1998] law was brought in there was a lot more fear of unknown issues around disease … but [today] the logic is just not borne out by any scientific or medical basis,” says Eamonn Murphy, UNAids regional director for Asia and the Pacific.

Instead, countries that still have such restrictions in place often do so because of “historical convention, ideology, or even passivity”, Murphy says. He notes that UNAids is renewing its focus on the issue this year, compiling a new report on national restrictions.

UNAids most recent comprehensive report on HIV-related travel and immigration laws in 2015 listed 35 countries with such restrictions.

However, incomplete data published in 2018 by UNAids named at least 18 countries that have policies restricting entry, stay or residence for people living with HIV. Information from many countries were left off the list, and will be updated this year to reflect the true extent. The same report found that 60 countries require testing for residence or other permits, including marriage, not limited to foreigners.

The exact numbers, however, are difficult to pin down, experts say. An independently researched global database counts 49 countries with HIV-related restrictions on long-term stay in 2018, based on information sourced from local embassies and reports from travellers and immigrants. Countries with restrictions include Russia, Singapore, and the United Arab Emirates.

“The data the countries present about themselves in diplomatic settings can be different from the policies that are actually executed,” says American epidemiologist Jessica Keralis, who has researched the public health impacts of such HIV-related restrictions.

For example, countries may not have regulations “on the books”, but employers can revoke visas for HIV-positive employees, or state insurance policy can make it difficult for immigrants to afford treatment, she says.

In other cases, official policy may not be known by regional or local officials and institutions.

These distinctions matter for HIV-positive immigrants, whether white-collar workers, migrant labourers or students, according to David Haerry, who publishes the Global Database on HIV-Specific Travel and Residence Restrictions, which names the 49 countries.

“Oftentimes people [sent abroad for work] don’t know and they fall in the trap: if you don’t know and you have to be tested on the ground, and then you are sent back on health grounds, your company knows,” he says. “It’s a big issue.”

Haerry receives daily emails through the database from people around the world wondering how to travel or relocate safely while living with HIV. In recent years, he’s seen restrictive policies become more of an issue for students looking to study abroad, but who fear the consequences of mandatory HIV testing even in countries where there is no explicit restriction on those who are HIV-positive.

For such situations, “we have no solution”, Haerry says.

Many national restrictions are holdovers from the 1980s, before the disease’s transmission was understood and the antiretroviral therapies and daily medications that can prevent its spread became widely available, according to UNAids’ Murphy. But he has seen progress globally.

A number of countries changed their policies after UNAids launched a 2008 campaign against the 59 governments that had bans at that time. The United States, South Korea and China were among the nations to remove restrictions in 2010, although South Korea retained some related to immigration, while China reportedly has mandatory HIV testing for some visas.

Singapore revised its own regulations in 2015 to allow people living with HIV to enter the country for short-term stays of less than three months, while South Korea in 2017 removed its final restriction, which mandated the testing of foreign teachers.

But conservative cultures, social stigma and inertia have kept some restrictions in play in other nations, experts say. The majority of such restrictions are found in conservative countries; more countries in the Middle East than anywhere else have them.

“The basis of discrimination is misconception and fear, and with HIV these boil down to drug use, men who have sex with men, and all these realities that countries don’t want to face,” says Peter Wiessner, who co-authors the global database. “There’s also xenophobia mixed in.”

That element can have a negative public health impact, according to Keralis.

“It communicates that HIV is a foreign contagion and a foreigners’ problem, and if [citizens] don’t mix with foreigners then they are not at risk,” she says. She notes that, paired with a lack of proper sex education, this can create a dangerous situation.

“There’s no incentive for people to seek more information or modify their behaviours,” she says.

Canada: Workshops find that HIV non-disclosure laws are little known amongst women living with HIV and contribute to social injustices

Published in aidsmap on February 4th, 2019

HIV non-disclosure laws perpetuate social injustices against women in Canada

Krishen Samuel

Published: 05 February 2019

People living with HIV in Canada can be charged with aggravated sexual assault and be registered as sexual offenders if they do not disclose their HIV status, but many HIV-positive women have little knowledge of this law, according to a recent qualitative study. The law contributes to increased HIV-related stigma, social injustices and vulnerability to violence for women living with HIV, argue Dr Saara Greene and colleagues.

Forty eight women took part in seven arts-based workshops which each took place over a four-day period. Each workshop included an education session regarding the legal implications of non-disclosure, followed by a focus group discussion that allowed women to share thoughts, feelings and concerns regarding the law.

Canada is one of many countries that continues to criminalise non-disclosure of HIV positive status in sexual acts between consenting individuals. Transmission of the virus does not need to occur: a person can be prosecuted for exposure to the virus in the absence of transmission.

In 2012, the Supreme Court of Canada clarified its position on HIV transmission, ruling that people living with HIV are legally required to disclose their status to sexual partners before engaging in sexual activities that pose a ‘realistic possibility of transmission’. According to the Court, two combined factors could be used as a defense against this realistic possibility of transmission: a low plasma viral load (under 1500 copies/ml) and the use of a condom.

Thus, the law does not acknowledge biomedical advances that conclusively show transmission is impossible if the infected individual is virally suppressed (see our factsheet on undetectable viral load and transmission). The ruling leaves room for those engaging in condomless sex with an undetectable viral load to be prosecuted. In Canada, a charge of aggravated sexual assault could carry a maximum sentence of life imprisonment and registration on the sex offender registry.

A more recent 2018 federal directive issued by the attorney general states that a person living with HIV who has maintained a suppressed viral load (under 200 copies/ml of blood) should not be prosecuted, because there is no realistic possibility of transmission. However, this directive only applies in Canada’s three territories and not in the provinces where the vast majority of the population live. Advocates are calling on the provinces to issue similar directives.

The workshops were carried out in 2016 and 2017, in three Canadaian provinces (Ontario, Saskatchewan and British Columbia). The median age of participants was 47 (range: 30-59); the majority of women were Indigenous (60%), with only a small percentage of white women (8%). It was important for minority women to be oversampled as HIV prevalence is nearly three times higher in Indigenous peoples across Canada, with high rates of HIV diagnoses occurring in young Indigenous women. Additionally, 42% of women charged with HIV non-disclosure are Indigenous.

Most women were heterosexual (73%), cisgender (94%) and born in Canada (79%). One-third of women were single, with 29% reporting a common-law relationship.

Analysis of the focus group discussions revealed the following themes:

Confusion and concerns regarding the law

Overall, the education sessions revealed that women were largely unfamiliar with and poorly-informed about laws pertaining to non-disclosure. Questions and concerns were related to legal implications (such as a whether charges could be brought against them for exposure in the absence of transmission or for sexual interactions several years ago). Several women asked what it meant to have a low viral load.

Social and legal injustice

Women felt that the law perpetuates existing injustices in the lives of diagnosed HIV positive women. Thus, factors such as stigma, sexism, racism, colonialism and a lack of education might put those already disadvantaged at a higher risk of being criminalised.

“Like even this isn’t accessible or something understandable for some of my people because we have literacy issues. Some of our people, they left residential school at grade 6 and grade 8…” (Jaqueline, Saskatchewan, speaking about a legal factsheet given to participants)

A contradiction inherent in HIV non-disclosure criminalisation law is that while individuals who are unaware of their HIV status and have a high viral load are more likely to unknowingly infect others, these individuals cannot be prosecuted under Canadian law as intent cannot be proven. The women expressed that the law unjustly targets those who are diagnosed:

“…When I was first diagnosed, I had a higher viral load because I wasn’t being treated. And so actually the silent people who don’t know are more at risk of passing it on. So, who is this [law] even protecting? We are the least likely to pass it on.” (Lori, British Columbia)

As a result of assault laws being used in non-disclosure cases, a common sentiment expressed by women living with HIV was that they were carrying a biological weapon. Thus, HIV stigma was internalised, as a result of the legal system depicting women as capable of inflicting serious harm on their partners:

“…If I was going to go over there and stab [participant] with a knife, that’s aggravated assault. So, they’re taking that knife away and using HIV. I may not have given it to her. So, it’s like the knife never even touched her or the knife wasn’t used. I’m still charged.” (Rachelle, British Columbia)

Sexual surveillance

Participants expressed a sense that they were under surveillance by the criminal justice system when it came to their sex lives. In order to prove innocence, women would need to provide evidence of both a low viral load and condom use, or of disclosure.

The researchers labelled this an ‘intimate injustice’, with HIV-positive women needing to prove their innocence within an inherently unjust and oppressive system. The lengths that women would have to go through to prove this innocence is reflected here:

“So how many people do you have in that room? You have the lawyer that’s witnessing the paper that you’re signing that you’ve disclosed. You have the doctor to say, ‘Yeah, you’re under a viral load’. You’ve got the forensic scientist there getting any evidence. You know, everybody is watching.” (Lilian, British Columbia)

A common question related to undetectability was:

‘So when I look at it, I’m undetectable. So, I cannot transmit HIV to who I’m going to have sex with. So why is it any of their business that I have it when I’m undetectable?’

Another common question was how to prove that a condom was used or that disclosure had occurred after a sexual encounter had taken place. It could come down to a ‘he said, she said’ situation, with the HIV-positive woman needing some form of conclusive proof that she had used a condom or disclosed her status prior to engaging in sexual contact.

“Okay, so say I had a sexual partner. I just met this guy. And my CD4 count is 880. I’m undetectable. But I’ve got to tell him before we get into bed. Do I need to make him sign a document and lock it up and have it witnessed by the neighbor?” (Zainab, Ontario)

Vulnerability to violence

Non-disclosure laws may place women at greater risk for violence. As many as 80% of Canadian women living with HIV have experienced violence in adulthood and the requirement to disclose HIV status to sexual partners could increase the likelihood of intimate partner violence by placing women in a vulnerable position.

Women expressed that they do not always have control over when or how sex occurs with their partners; this negates their agency when it comes to negotiating condom use or disclosing their HIV status.

There was also the question of how disclosure applied in cases of domestic abuse and rape. The law would require women to disclose to abusive partners, placing them at risk of even more violence. The troubling nature of this was expressed in this quote:

“I was raped by three [people] in [Canadian city]. They broke into my home and they held me prisoner for 24 hours and beat me and raped me. And if I had told him I was HIV positive, I would have been dead. I know it. So where does that fit in the picture?” (Julie, British Columbia)

Additionally, the law could be used against HIV-positive women by vindictive partners wishing to ‘punish’ them. Many women had been threatened with charges for non-disclosure by disgruntled partners:

“Could they turn around and even if you’re honest and told them, then … they lied and said, ‘Well, I caught it from her’, or him. And they go to the police and get them charged, just out to be spiteful and mean.” (Catherine, Saskatchewan)

Concerns over violence were particularly salient for Indigenous women:

“When you include the Indigenous community and the numbers and statistics there, like we’re already like 10 times the rate of being gone missing, murdered and, you know, facing violence every day. So, when you throw in … you know, HIV, you know, like it just becomes sometimes not even safe. A lot of people stay in very vulnerable situations because of this law…” (Jaqueline, Saskatchewan)

Conclusion

The researchers conclude that for women living with HIV in Canada, non-disclosure laws can lead to unjust victimisation, perpetuating legal and social injustices. Many of the women did not have the necessary legal knowledge to fully understand the implications of their sexual behaviour to begin with. HIV-related stigma has become legally entrenched and results in women who are anxious about sexual encounters and fearful that they will need to find ways of proving their innocence. Non-disclosure laws may also lead to increased violence against women.

When combined with factors such as sexism, racism, colonialism and violence against women, HIV criminalisation results in continued oppression and thus, advocacy for legal reform is necessary and urgent. The recent federal directive is a step in the right direction but it will still take some time for this to filter down to provincial police and prosecutors.

Reference

Greene S et al. How women living with HIV react and respond to learning about Canadian law that criminalises HIV non-disclosure: ‘how do you prove that you told?’ Culture, Health & Sexuality online ahead of print, 2019. (Abstract).

Webinar: Media Strategy in HIV Criminalization Reform Efforts: After HIV Is Not a Crime III Series (PWN-USA, 2019)

For advocates working on campaigns to repeal or reform HIV criminalization laws in their states, the question about when it is and isn’t a good idea to seek press coverage, how to talk about the campaign to the press, and what options are available for controlling the message are all fundamental strategic questions. Positive Women’s Network-USA Communications Director Jennie Smith-Camejo talks strategy and best practices in this webinar based off the in-person breakout session at HIV Is Not a Crime III Training Academy in 2018 as part of the After HINAC III webinar series.

Webinar: Molecular HIV Surveillance (PWN-USA, 2019)

PWN’s Barb Cardell’s webinar on Molecular HIV Surveillance and its implications for marginalized communities living with HIV, including intersections with HIV criminalization.

US: Robert Suttle reflects on outdated HIV-specific criminalisation laws and the work of advocates to change them all over the US

by Joseph Darius Jaafari

UNDER LOUISIANA LAW, YOU CAN WIND UP WITH A $5,000 FINE AND FIVE YEARS’ JAIL TIME IF SOMEONE COMES IN CONTACT WITH YOUR SPIT — IF YOU’RE HIV POSITIVE. THESE LAWS ARE BASED ON OUTDATED SCIENCE AND MULTIPLE ORGANIZATIONS ARE WORKING TO CHANGE THEM.

Whenever Robert Suttle thinks about his time in jail, his eyes go soft, he lets out a long breath and his lips purse a bit. It’s noticeable that he — after almost a decade — still gets emotional about what put him behind bars.

In 2008, while working as an assistant clerk for the Louisiana Court of Appeals, Suttle went through a bitter breakup that resulted in a tit-for-tat trial, ending in Suttle being sentenced to six months in jail and registering as a sex offender for intentionally exposing a sexual partner to HIV. But there was no transmission of the virus.

And even though Suttle says he disclosed his status to his partner and that the sex was consensual, it didn’t matter much under Louisiana’s HIV exposure law, which states that anyone with HIV or AIDS who has unprotected sex can be tried and charged with a nonviolent felony. Offenders can be sentenced to up to 10 years in prison and must register as a sex offender in some cases.

But Louisiana’s intentional HIV exposure statute, enacted in 1987, revised in 1993 and again in 2011, is out of date and not backed by science. For example, spitting and biting are considered grounds to be charged for criminal exposure to AIDS, even though it’s impossible to transfer the virus through spit and exceedingly rare for HIV to be passed on through biting (and the risk is nonexistent if the skin isn’t broken).

What’s more, Suttle, who was diagnosed with HIV in 2002, couldn’t pass the virus on anyway. Antiretroviral treatment had made his viral load undetectable, which means the level of HIV in his blood was so low that it would’ve been impossible to transmit.

“I didn’t quite understand how it could come to this,” Suttle says. “It was being gay and HIV positive that led me to … being criminally liable.”

As more people become aware of possible criminal charges — thanks in part to local reporting on alleged offenders — some of those most at-risk are unwilling to get tested. Criminalizing one’s status has created a stigma, advocates say, which in turn can endanger whole communities.

“[People know] that if they test positive, they can get charged or arrested,” says Gina Brown, an HIV and AIDS activist in New Orleans who is HIV positive. “The laws need to change, and people in charge need to get educated.”

Across the nation, HIV transmissions have been steadily declining since the beginning of the decade. At the same time, the demographics of the disease have changed. No longer does HIV primarily affect gay men; today, those who are most at risk also include injection drug users and poor people of color, particularly in the South. Despite that shift, regulations and laws that criminalize one’s HIV status still abound, and they have roots in outdated science that has largely been debunked.

There are currently 26 states with HIV-specific criminalization laws, some of which penalize behavior regardless of whether the virus was actually transmitted. That number was higher in the 1980s and ’90s, when fear of HIV — and myths around how it spread — was rampant. Lawmakers claimed at the time that the statutes were meant to protect the general public. Instead, they have had the opposite effect: Since you can’t be prosecuted if you don’t know your status, there’s an incentive to not getting tested. Studies have also shown that HIV criminalization has little to no effect on deterring people from spreading the virus willingly, and in fact, such laws have only worsened its spread.

Nearly all of the states with the highest rates of new HIV diagnoses — in 2017, Louisiana ranked third — have HIV-specific exposure laws still on the books.

“People don’t know the collateral consequences,” says Suttle, who now works as an assistant director at Sero Project, a nonprofit that fights stigma and discrimination by focusing on HIV criminalization. “These laws hinder people from getting care.”

Suttle says the biggest obstacle is education, especially among people who still view HIV and AIDS as a death sentence.

“Education of the masses cannot be stressed enough. You can talk to anybody, and people honestly think that [people charged under HIV exposure laws] should be fully prosecuted and locked up,” Suttle says, adding that Sero Project has tried to humanize people living with HIV through anti-criminalization campaigns, lobbying and public outreach.

Sero Project is one of only a handful of national organizations — the Elizabeth Taylor AIDS Foundation and the Center for HIV Law and Policy are two others — that have been on the front lines of fighting against HIV criminalization.

This year, Sero Project, in partnership with the Positive Women’s Network, launched a training academy to teach advocates how to organize and repeal state HIV criminalization laws. In South Carolina, Sero Project’s training helped establish a coalition of 50 lawmakers, advocates and nonprofits to try and change the state’s HIV criminalization laws.

“They gave us the tools to do our own work here within our community, and educate people. Now we have more and more people who are interested, because every time we get out and share with the community, we’re getting more people asking about the laws,” says Stacy Jennings, chair of the Positive Women’s Network regional chapter in South Carolina. “It’s sad that [people living with HIV] don’t know [about the laws] because they should know. Every chance we get we’re teaching them.”

As a result of Sero Project’s efforts to get communities educated on local laws, Suttle has seen a sea change in the number of people coming forward to fight the stigma around being HIV positive.

And that’s been helpful in places like Louisiana, where advocates say the need for educating and empowering people to get tested and stay healthy is dire.

“We actually have been able to get into the offices of legislators and tell them why this law is outdated and plain wrong,” says Brown, the AIDS activist. “We have some of the highest rates of HIV transmission in the country, and that won’t get better so long as there are laws that actively make people fearful of getting tested.”

—

This is the third installment in NationSwell’s multimedia series “Positive in the South,” which explores the HIV crisis in the Southern U.S., and profiles the people and organizations working to alleviate it.

Published in NationSwell on December 22, 2018

Belarus: Welcoming important developments in the fight against unjust HIV criminalisation

HIV JUSTICE WORLDWIDE along with our partners at The Eurasian Women’s Network on AIDS and Global Network of People Living with HIV (GNP+) welcome this week’s announcement of an amendment to Article 157 of the Criminal Code of the Republic of Belarus, which finally allows consent following disclosure to sexual partner as a defence. Whilst recognizing there is still a long way to go to remove all unjust criminal laws against people living with HIV in Belarus, we congratulate our partners and colleagues in Belarus People PLUS for this achievement!

Today, Parliamentarians of the House of Representatives of the National Assembly of the Republic of Belarus adopted in the second reading three bills, one of which was the law “On introducing amendments to some codes of the Republic of Belarus”. Among other changes, an amendment was adopted to article 157 of the Criminal Code of the Republic of Belarus (one of the most draconian HIV-specific criminal laws in the world), which now allows that people who have warned their partners will no longer be held criminally responsible for potential or perceived HIV exposure or transmission.

Until today, Article 157 states that people living with HIV are totally criminally liable for potential or perceived HIV exposure or transmission, even if the so-called injured party had no complaints against their partner, knew about the risks and consented. Prosecutions took place because infectious disease doctors informed police and many people were convicted (read Yana’s story here)

In 2017, 130 criminal cases were initiated under Article 157 of the Criminal Code of the Republic of Belarus, with another 48 in the first half of 2018. Now, it will be possible to revisit those cases.

Anatoly Leshenok, representative of the NGO, People Plus states: “The adopted changes are only the first step in achieving our goal of decriminalising HIV transmission. According to information received from the department for drafting bills, other, more fundamental changes to Article 157 of the Criminal Code of Belarus have not been approved. It is necessary to continue to work with these State structures and with public opinion in order to form a more tolerant attitude towards HIV-positive people. But those changes that have been adopted today – that’s a success for our team! ”

Anatoly Leshenok. Photo: UNAIDS Country Office in Belarus

After approval by the Council of the Republic and the President, the amendments will make it possible to revisit previous sentences of the courts, and improve lives of people that were broken previously, as well it provide opportunity now and in the future for people living with HIV in serodiscordant partnerships to plan their lives without worrying if they are criminals every time they have sex.

US: New report by the Williams Institute shows clear disparities in enforcement of HIV criminalization laws in Florida

Study shows impact of HIV criminalization laws

Los Angeles – Florida laws that criminalize people living with HIV directly affected 614 people from 1986 to 2017, according to a new report by the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law. Researchers found that women were disproportionately affected by HIV criminalization. White women were disproportionately arrested for HIV offenses in Florida, and black women were most likely to be convicted for HIV offenses related to sex work. HIV criminalization is a term used to describe laws that either criminalize otherwise legal conduct or increase the penalties for illegal conduct based upon a person’s HIV-positive status. More than two-thirds of US states and territories have enacted HIV criminal laws.

“Our study shows that certain communities, whether defined by gender, race/ethnicity, or sex-worker status, are bearing more of the weight of these laws,” said lead author Amira Hasenbush. “What’s more, these HIV criminal laws, which were originally intended to control the spread of HIV by prosecuting individuals who expose others, don’t require proof of transmission or even exposure in most cases. So the laws are not doing what they set out to do.”

Key findings: Individuals were arrested under HIV-related statutes in 47 out of the 67 counties in Florida. The highest prevalence of HIV in the state is found in Miami-Dade (24%) and Broward Counties (18%), but those counties represent only 4% and 3%, respectively, of the HIV-related arrests. On the other hand, Duval County is home to only 6% of the people living with HIV in Florida but 23% of all HIV-related arrests in the state. Over half (56%) of all individuals arrested under an HIV-related offense were women. More than four in ten people arrested under an HIV-related offense were black (43%) and white women were more likely to be arrested for an HIV-criminal offense than other groups. Black men were more likely to be convicted of an HIV-related offense than white men and white women. Convictions for HIV arrests were twice as likely when there was a concurrent sex work arrest than when the HIV offense occurred outside of the context of sex work. Read the report Williamsinstitute.law.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/HIV-Criminalization-Florida-Oct-2018.pdf

Published in Baltimore Outloud on October 13, 2018

Beyond Blame 2018 Meeting Report and Evaluation Now Available

Beyond Blame 2018: Challenging HIV Criminalisation was a one-day meeting for activists, advocates, judges, lawyers, scientists, healthcare professionals and researchers working to end HIV criminalisation. Held at the historic De Balie in Amsterdam, immediately preceding the 22nd International AIDS Conference (AIDS 2018), the meeting was convened by HIV JUSTICE WORLDWIDE and supported by a grant from the Robert Carr Fund for Civil Society Networks.

The Meeting Report and Evaluation, written by the meeting’s lead rapporteur, Sally Cameron, Senior Policy Analyst for the HIV Justice Network, is now available for download here.

The meeting discussed progress on the global effort to combat the unjust use of the criminal law against people living with HIV, including practical opportunities for advocates working in different jurisdictions to share knowledge, collaborate, and energise the global fight against HIV criminalisation. The programme included keynote presentations, interactive panels, and more intimate workshops focusing on critical issues in the fight against HIV criminalisation around the world.

The more than 150 attendees at the meeting came from 30 countries covering most regions of the world including Africa, Asia and the Pacific, Eastern Europe and Central Asia, Latin and North America and Western Europe. Participation was extended to a global audience through livestreaming of the meeting on the HIV JUSTICE WORLDWIDE YouTube Channel, with interaction facilitated through the use of Twitter (using the hashtag #BeyondBlame2018) to ask questions of panellists and other speakers. See our Twitter Moments story here.

Following the meeting, participants were surveyed to gauge the event’s success. All participants rated Beyond Blame 2018 as good (6%), very good (37%), or excellent (57%), with 100% of participants saying that Beyond Blame 2018 had provided useful information and evidence they could use to advocate against HIV criminalisation.

A video recording of the entire meeting is available on HIV JUSTICE WORLDWIDE’s YouTube Chanel.

Key points

The experience of HIV criminalisation was a poor fit for individual’s actions and the consequences of those actions, particularly where actions included little or no possibility of transmission or where courts did not address scientific evidence
The consequences of prosecution for alleged HIV non-disclosure prior to sex are enormous and may include being ostracised, dealing with trauma and ongoing mental health issues, loss of social standing, financial instability, multiple barriers to participation in society, and sex offender registration
Survivors of the experience shared a sense of solidarity with others who had been through the system, and were determined to use their voices to create change so that others do not have to go through similar experiences
Becoming an advocate against HIV criminalisation is empowering and helps to make sense of individuals’ experiences

The movement against HIV criminalisation has grown significantly over the last decade but as the movement has grown, so has understanding of the breadth of the issue, with new cases and laws frequently uncovered in different parts of the world.
As well as stigma, there are multiple structural barriers in place enabling HIV criminalisation, including lags in getting modern science into courtrooms and incentives for police to bring cases for prosecution.
Community mobilisation is vital to successful advocacy. That work requires funding, education, and dialogue among those most affected to develop local agendas for change.
Criminalisation is complex and more work is required to build legal literacy of local communities.
Regional and global organisations play a vital role supporting local organisations to network and increase understanding and capacity for advocacy.
There have already been many advocacy successes, frequently the result of interagency collaboration and effective community mobilisation.

It is critical to frame advocacy against HIV criminalisation around justice, effective public health strategy and science rather than relying on science alone, as this more comprehensive framing is both more strategic and will help prevent injustices that may result from a reliance on science alone.
There have been lengthy delays between scientific and medical understanding of HIV being substantiated in large scale, authoritative trials, and that knowledge being accepted by courts.
Improving courts’ understanding that effective treatment radically reduces HIV transmission risk (galvanised in the grassroots ‘U=U’ movement) has the potential to dramatically decrease the number of prosecutions and convictions associated with HIV criminalisation and could lead to a modernisation of HIV-related laws.
Great care must be exercised when advocating a ‘U=U’ position at policy/law reform level, as doing so has the potential to deflect attention from issues of justice, particularly the need to repeal HIV-specific laws, stop the overly broad application of laws, and ensure that people who are not on treatment, cannot access viral load testing and/or who have a detectable viral load are not left behind.
Courts’ poor understanding of the effectiveness of modern antiretroviral therapies contributes to laws being inappropriately applied and people being convicted and sentenced to lengthy jail terms because of an exaggerated perception of ‘the harms’ caused by HIV.
HIV-related stigma remains a major impediment to the application of modern science into the courtroom, and a major issue undermining justice for people living with HIV throughout all legal systems.
HIV prevention, including individuals living with HIV accessing and remaining on treatment, is as much the responsibility of governments as individuals, and governments should ensure accessible, affordable and supportive health systems to enable everyone to access HIV prevention and treatment.
New education campaigns are required, bringing modern scientific understanding into community health education.
Continuing to work in silos is slowing our response to the HIV epidemic.

HIV criminalisation plays out in social contexts, with patriarchal social structures and gender discrimination intersecting with race, class, sexuality and other factors to exacerbate existing social inequalities.
Women’s efforts to seek protections from the criminal justice system are not always feminist; they often further the carceral state and promote criminalisation.
Interventions by some purporting to speak on behalf of women’s safety or HIV prevention efforts have delivered limited successes because social power, the structuring of laws and the ways laws are administered remain rooted in patriarchal power and structural violence.
Feminist approaches must recognise that women’s experiences differ according to a range of factors including race, class, types of work, immigration status, the experience of colonisation, and others.
For many women, HIV disclosure is not a safe option.
More work is needed to increase legal literacy and support for local women to develop and lead HIV criminalisation advocacy based on their local context.
When women affected by HIV have had the opportunity to consider the way that ‘protective’ HIV laws are likely to be applied, they have often concluded that those laws will be used against them and have taken action to advocate against the use of those laws.

At the end of the meeting, participants were asked to make some closing observations. These included:

Recognising that the event had allowed a variety of voices to be heard. In particular, autobiographical voices were the most authentic and most powerful: people speaking about their own experiences. This model which deferred to those communicating personal experiences, should be use when speaking to those in power.
Appreciating that there was enormous value in hearing concrete examples of how people are working to address HIV criminalisation, particularly when working intersectionally. It is important to capture these practical examples and make them available (noting practical examples will form the focus of the pending Advancing HIV Justice 3 report).
Understanding that U=U is based on a degree of privilege that is not shared by all people living with HIV. It is vital that accurate science informs HIV criminalisation as a means to reduce the number of people being prosecuted, however, people who are not on treatment are likely to become the new ‘scapegoats’. It is important that we take all opportunities to build bridges between U=U and anti-HIV criminalisation advocates, to create strong pathways to work together and support shared work.
Noting the importance of calling out racism and colonialism and their effects.
Observing that more effort is required to better understand and improve the role of police, health care providers and peer educators to limit HIV criminalisation.
Exploring innovative ways to advocate against HIV criminalisation, including community education work through the use of art, theatre, dance and other mechanisms.
Concluding that we must challenge ourselves going forward. That we must make the circle bigger. That next time we meet, we should challenge ourselves to bring someone who doesn’t agree with us. That we each find five people who aren’t on our side or don’t believe HIV criminalisation is a problem and we find ways and means (including funding) to bring them to the next Beyond Blame.