SF Legislators Announce Bill to Modernize Discriminatory HIV Criminalization Laws

On Monday, February 6, Senator Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco) and Assemblymembers Todd Gloria (D-San Diego) and David Chiu (D-San Francisco) will join representatives of LGBT, public health and HIV advocacy organizations to announce a bill to modernize California laws that criminalize and stigmatize people with HIV.

"We have made so many advances to allow HIV-positive people to live normal, healthy, productive lives and to the point where someone who is HIV-positive and on medication can be virally suppressed so that it is almost impossible for them to infect anybody else," said Wiener, who is HIV-negative and made headlines in 2014 for announcing he was on PrEP, to The Pride LA. "Yet we have these old laws that treat anyone who is HIV-positive almost as an automatic criminal."

Attending the introduction of a bill updating California's antiquated HIV laws are Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco); Asm. Todd Gloria (D-San Diego); Asm. David Chiu (D-San Francisco); and Rick Zbur, Executive Director, Equality California.

California's laws criminalizing HIV were passed in the 1980s and 1990s, a time of fear and ignorance about HIV and its transmission. Modern treatments can reduce the risk of transmission to near zero, yet state laws concerning HIV remain mired in the 1980s. This legislation will amend California's HIV criminalization laws to make them consistent with laws involving other serious communicable diseases.

Also attending are Naina Khanna, Executive Director, Positive Women's Network; Dr. Edward Machtinger, Director, Women's HIV Program, UCSF; Shannon Weber, Director, HIVE; and San Francisco Supervisor Jeff Sheehy.

The event will be held at Strut -- SF AIDS Foundation Health and Wellness Center, 470 Castro St., Third Floor., San Francisco, CA 94114.