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Subscribe to RSSCanada's top court said on Friday that failing to tell a sexual partner you have HIV is only sexual assault if there is "a realistic possibility" of transmitting the virus that causes AIDS.
In a unanimous decision, the Supreme Court of Canada rejected the government's argument that everyone who has HIV should be required to disclose that condition to all sexual partners in any circumstance.
Several groups involved in the case, including the Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network and the Canadian AIDS Society, took issue with the court's standard of a "realistic possibility," saying it is too severe, and calling the decision "a major step backwards for public health and human rights."
The HIV groups said in a release that the risk of spreading HIV is made negligible just by using condoms, and that the court's decision "blatantly ignores solid science."
"What you're talking about here is a vulnerable, marginalized group of people who are going to be forced to go around volunteering to anyone with whom they're going to have sexual contact, that they belong to that vulnerable, marginalized group," Michael Feder, a lawyer for the British Columbia Civil Liberties Association, told the CBC.
In 1998, the court found that not telling a partner about one's HIV status was a form of aggravated sexual assault if there was "significant risk of bodily harm." On Friday, the court clarified what might constitute a significant risk.
It said someone with a low viral load who uses a condom has not put their partner at significant risk. Viral load measures the severity of HIV infection, and some treatments reduce the level, making transmission less likely.
"As noted by the court of appeal, the transmissibility of HIV is proportional to the viral load, i.e. the quantity of HIV copies in the blood," the decision said, according to City News. "The viral load of an untreated HIV patient ranges from 10,000 copies to a few million copies per millilitre.
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"When a patient undergoes anti-retroviral treatment, the viral load shrinks rapidly to less than 1,500 copies per millilitre (low viral load), and can even be brought down to less than 50 copies per millilitre (undetectable viral load) over a longer period of time. This appears to be scientifically accepted at this point, on the evidence in this case," the decision said.
The court noted that standards might change in future cases since its decision does not preclude the law from "adapting to future advances in treatment" or risk factors it had not directly considered.
It said that risk of transmission, rather than actual transmission, is not a crime in many other countries, and that this "sounds a note of caution against extending the criminal law beyond its appropriate reach in this complex and emerging area of law."
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Forcing everyone to disclose their HIV status would risk sending people who have not put anyone at risk to prison, the court said.
Two cases were considered by the court, the first one involving a man who had sex with nine women, including a 12-year-old girl, after being diagnosed with HIV in 2004, CBC reported. Clato Mabior didn't tell the women he was HIV positive.
None of the women contracted the disease, City News said. The Supreme Court set aside one of Mabior's convictions because in that respective situation he used a condom and had a low viral load. In Mabior's case, this decision has little consequence, since he was deported to South Sudan in February, City News said.
In the second case, a Quebec woman who had unprotected sex with her partner in 2000 did not tell him she was HIV-positive.
According to City News, the woman had been taking anti-retroviral drugs after she was diagnosed with HIV nine years earlier.
"Here low — indeed undetectable — viral load was established," the Supreme Court concluded, according to City News.
The court affirmed an earlier appeal court decision to strike down the woman's conviction for aggravated assault and sexual assault.
Reuters contributed to this report.
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People who knowingly infect some one with HIV or any other deadly virus need to go to jail
This will open the path for more fruits to get AIDS...still the largest segment of AIDS cases.
f'ing rediculous. i guess so long as it's 2 gay men i could care less. But once u get heterosexuals involved and the potential exists to pass it on to children, it's a absurd
they deport you for having sex with a 12 year old,way to go canada
How is it even possible that a 12 year old would be involved in this disgusting situation?
LOL, well seen as how Canada was responsible for "Patient Zero" better known as the "gay guy" who ran around spreading aides to as many other gays as humanly possible, you would think that the idiots in Canada would see that many gays in the LGBT community have a fascination of spreading the disease as it stands Back in the early 90's, many gays were trying to set up "AIDS Parties" where a bunch of them would meet and "get it over with"....My gosh! And you actually have some morons that will try to argue homosexuality not being a mental disorder as it had been under the APA Diagnosis handbook for years. Yeah, I know, the past 100 years of research was all bias and done by a bunch of Christians homphobes who hate gays deep down inside.......right..... In the United States if you try to bit a LEO and you have Hep, HIV etc... you are charged with attempted murder of a LEO period. No ACLU is going to save your infected azz. Now you have all a group of these AIDS carriers who dismiss it now just because there are drugs that can give them a longer life. They all the sudden lost the fear factor behind their disease and now they could care less who gets infested with it to the point where they feel that they no longer have to tell a partner who they are with that they have this disease? You know, that's why AIDS medication is constantly being revamped every 3 months because of the fact that CDC reports that AIDS is in a constant morphing state. What this means to people who don't have common sense is that AIDS mutates and one day those at the CDC are going to run into a road block when a strain of HIV/AIDS is no longer treatable similar to Black Plague Syphilis. Just a little FYI, BPS is in fact a real STD that is incurable and during the WWII days and after, several US Military members contracted the disease and were bared from every being able to return to the US ever again because the strain is unknown in the US. One of the rumors was this was one of the reasons why the US Government closed the base in the Philipeans
If you you got garbage in your body you don't have a right to pass it on.
I think someone needs to inject LOW VIRAL LOADS into the legislators bottled water.
Then watch how long it takes to become a criminal act.
The Canadian Supreme Court is just as stupid the the U.S. Supreme Court.
Under what circumstances is a person less HIV Positive than another. None, as far as I know. I have taken a few microbiology classes in my day, and HIV is always with you once infected. If it were not, it would be cured... There is no level at which you can't infect someone. I have a Canadian brother-in-law who is HIV Positive and he has undetectable levels in his system, but still managed to infect my husbands brother...
Yup, the court is protecting the privacy of a person with an illness that can kill you. It might not happen tomorrow, but if you had an immune disease prior to infection, it could happen much sooner than you ever expected...
This law is dangerous for Gay Men... For everyone...
all i can say is if i WAS thinking about sleeping with someone and they were hiv positive and did not tell me before we slept together (so i could walk away), and I got hiv, i would kill them!!
No Kidding!
My husband's brother got it from a Canadian guy (they are now married)... His medication bill in the U.S. was $1700.00 per month... He only recieved $2,500 per month total from his retirement...
AIDs is the single most preventable deadly desease in the world.Just wrap or don't play.Unfortunately,gays can't keep it in their pants,with or without protection.Thus the constant spread of AIDS.That your brother pays almost as much as he makes is not an issue.He infected himself by having unsafe sex.I understand Aids patients don't eat much so $800 should be enough to cover his food and rent bill.And the last thing he needs to do is entertain.
People with AIDS should be sent to Africa to live; they could relax, enjoy the sunshine, and know they have plenty of company.
How, exactly, is this court ruling going to help with Public Health?
I am sometimes asked whether i support the Death Penalty for murder. The answer is that while THEORETICALLY I do, practically, except in cases that involve multiple witnesses and a very obvious killer (think the Fort Hood Shooter in the US, for example), I do not. Why?
Because I do not trust judges and attorneys to think coherently in matters that require discretion and a discerning intelligence. If they possessed those abilities, they would not be going to practicing or deciding Law.
Note, for example, this case and the "reasoning" that went into it. QED.
First to the person who mentioned gay people, gay people aren't the only ones who get and transfer the aids virus.
Shame on Canada. I can't believe they would make such a decision. you can't tell me that HIV is not a death sentence, your whole life changes.
So what if you are seeing someone and the relationship escalates and you ask are you HIV or Herpes infected? If they say no, which they will or they would never have sex again; does that make it OK to lie when asked?
I ask and I also asked to see their clean card. I want to know when they were last tested for STD's and if they have a virus that is communicable.
This is the most ignorant thing that has really ever happened in Canada. With the swipe of one decision the court has condemned many people to death in Canada and around the world. Thanks for nothing Canada. Canada has always been our nearest and dearest friends in this world now they are a very dangerous country. HIV is one of the worst things to hide being equal to Hepatitis B in deadly endings. What was the court in Canada thinking of it as, a sinus infection??? Well for one I will quit getting medications from Canada now and anything else that is shipped via USP/FEDEX/DHL and other carriers of mail. Shut the border and don't let the people of Canada in the USA anymore as they might kill us here with their silence. What a shame that Canada now has to be on the do not visit list for American Citizens, just to protect us all from their diseases.
Be it that gays are probably at the root of this legislation, I find it hard to believe that anything they say or do has any vested interest in anything except themselves. Anyone that would lobby for the right to conceal a virus that could shave scores of years off someones life doesn't have any concerns for others or their rights. It becomes clear that the right to engage in sex trumps every other concern. life altering sex no less
Makes you wonder about their motives in all the other legislation they love to enact. Whats the real motive behind exposing kids in school to a gay life style. I still can't believe they let HIV pos people work in the food industry. Don't pi$$ off the gay waiter he might bite his tongue and spit in your food.
lets face it the world has lost its mind
Are these judges retarded...or HIV carriers themselves?? Or perhaps both.
I'm Glad I'm not in canada and hope them stupid Judges get aids. According to them idiots you can't get hiv from sex with condoms well dumb @!$%#s condoms do break and hiv is spread by exchanging bodily fluids not just from have sex.
Wow......Strap up......Keep those condoms on. And if you go down make sure there is some rubber between your mouth and the privates.
I am celibate It's too crazy out there.
Its only fair that the judges go first to show us exactly how safe it is!!! This is rediculous.....and so we can then come back when it didnt work and when we test positive and we can then havethe decision before we drop dead of AIDS of course!!!
It's only a matter of time before a northern Mexifornia federal judge comes up with a comparable ruling.Hopefully,its' effect will take hold soon enough for me to go back to a reclaimed San Fransissyco!I doubt it,but its' a dream.Can't bring your kids there because the gay are so militant and insist on running around without clothes.Can't go to parks or walk down anything but main streets because the drunken homeless will attack,can't go to any of the local tourist traps because criminals run rampent in those areas committing grab and runs,strongarm robberies and muggings.The last time We were in San Fransissyco,we brought some English friends who were dying to see SF.They almost did! They were rob and beaten up with the robbers using a gun.The day before,we had to remove their daughter from the streets because of the rudeness of gays.The day following their attack,homeless people were violently appearing everywhere we went.They were nervous so we left the City.Never been back and want until the people who live there grow up!They have never been back to America!
Here we go again,gays wanting special treatment or attention to themselves.They wont be happy until every Catholic church is closed,every minister is defrocted,every state has agreed to marry them,every federal agency agrees to give them a hand full of ntitlements and every straight person has aids or some form of venerial desease!Then they will fold up their "gay pride " flags and proclaim that day "gay day",a national day of self loathing!
Any historian could read that this type of controversy has the classic signs of something that progresses to an eventual shootout. It could have been handled better than this.
Apparently Man Slaughter is now legal in Canada,
"Boy Slaughter!"
TYpical Court mentality. Lets help the perpetrator not the victim. Thier argument that it might open the door to putting people in prison for whats already happened shows their stupidity, Just set a date, go from there.
Looks like Canada has found a way to thin the gay population and the whores and whore mongers!
This is a very sad and stupid day when keeping something like having HIV is more important than preventing the spread of HIV. I don't care how low the chances are of spreading it in my opinion any knowledge on the infected persons not divulged to another should be more than sexual assault it should be attempted murder. It is giving someone else a disease that can't be cured and will ultimately kill you. Saying "just use condoms" is a stupid response and anyone that knows basic human behavior knows that not everyone does in all circumstances. Very stupid ruling. Word of advice to everyone out there always use condoms and apparently now don't get with anyone from Canada because they don't have to tell you if they have HIV.