Australian man
convicted of spreading HIV

An Australian gay man has been convicted and jailed for 10 years for deliberately infecting a sex partner with HIV, marking the first such conviction in Queensland, according to press reports. Mark Kenneth Reid, 37, claimed the man who became infected had been aware of Reid's HIV infection and chose to have unprotected sex anyway, but the man testified that Reid had told him he had been tested for HIV antibodies and was uninfected.

Although most government and law enforcement officials around the world support HIV exposure laws like the one that lead to Reid's conviction, some AIDS advocates say the measures stigmatize HIV-positive people and criminalize any sexual activity by those infected with the virus. They also say that because HIV exposure laws are based on the fact that someone must know that he or she is infected in order to be charged with a crime, many people will forgo HIV antibody testing, which creates a public-health risk. (Advocate.com)