Negligible risk of transmitting HIV during sex when viral load is suppressed
“In a related commentary, Richard Elliott, Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network, Toronto, Ontario, also welcomes Justice Canada’s conclusions that the criminal law should generally not apply in various circumstances, including cases where condoms are used. However, he cautions that the qualitative descriptions of HIV transmission risk used by the study authors potentially overstate risk as understood in the criminal justice system. “[The study authors’] qualitative assessments of transmission risk apply risk categories originally developed 30 years ago to enable public education about safer sex and health risk reduction in general,” Elliott writes. “These categories reflect the relative riskiness of different activities. But they should not be transposed into a system tasked with determining criminal liability based on risk associated with a single act.”
