Missouri Youth Faces Stiff Sentence Under Stigmatizing HIV Criminalization Law

Missouri youth faces stiff sentence under stigmatizing HIV criminalization law, according to an article by Olivia Ford in The Body. The article refers to the case of a Missouri college student who is facing felony charges for having sex while HIV positive, under the state's HIV-specific criminal law. The article notes that, according to resources and research made available by The Center for HIV Law and Policy, HIV-specific criminal laws do not keep people from becoming HIV positive. As the article explains, HIV-specific criminal laws punish people who take the proactive, health-affirming step of knowing their HIV status, because someone can only be prosecuted if he or she has had a positive HIV test result.