HIV laws harsh but necessary

If someone tried to drive with a blood alcohol content of .08 or higher, he or she would be breaking the law and subject to punishment.

He wouldn’t be absolved of his crime because he didn’t kill anyone while driving drunk, and his case wouldn’t be dismissed merely because he wasn’t intending to hurt or kill others.  

By choosing to get behind the wheel of a car while under the influence of alcohol, people are endangering the lives of those around then with their reckless behavior.

The laws against drunken driving exist not to punish people for using alcohol, but to protect the public at large.

If someone who is HIV-positive has sex with someone and neglects to inform his or her sexual partner, he or she is breaking laws put in place to protect the
public.

Like someone who is drunk driving, the person would be recklessly endangering others. The law exists not to stigmatize those with HIV, but to protect the public from harm.

Take the case of Michael Johnson, the former Indianapolis high school wrestling star accused of exposing at least five men to HIV without their knowledge.

The HIV-positive 21-year-old allegedly denied having any diseases when two of his sexual partners asked, and he never mentioned his diagnosis to three others.

Johnson is currently in jail in St. Charles, Mo., facing five felony charges that could earn him decades in prison, including a count of recklessly infecting another with HIV.

This is a class A felony, punishable in Missouri with 10 years to life in prison.

Some would argue that such heavy penalties create a leper-like ostracism for the HIV-positive community, or that they encourage potentially HIV-positive individuals to willfully refuse testing.

While these are certainly possible outcomes, there doesn’t seem to be a good alternative to legally requiring HIV-positive individuals to inform their partners of their diagnosis before sexual activity.  

Like drinking and driving, increased awareness of the problem would help prevent cases like Johnson’s from occurring in the first place, but it wouldn’t stop all of them.

I don’t believe Johnson is an evil man, but he broke the law and endangered the lives of at least five others.

By lying about his HIV, Johnson proved to be a threat to the public health as much as if he had decided to drive drunk.  

Our current system for dealing with this crime may be imperfect, but it remains the best solution we have.

­— kkusisto@indiana.edu