The HIV/AIDS community would like to have a serious word with anyone spouting this terrible take.

Criminalization of viruses does not protect anyone. Laws that criminalize STIs have been disproportionately used against marginalized communities for centuries.

See: HIV criminalization in the 80s/90s.

Also: the American Plan of the 1910s onward. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chamberlain–Kahn_Act

As someone with herpes who was not disclosed to by the person who gave it to her, I understand why folks are immediately drawn to criminalizing viruses. But data has proven that criminalization increases stigma and makes people less likely to get tested. It backfires.

People with viruses (be it COVID or herpes or HIV) have an ethical responsibility to share their status and reduce risk of transmission to others in whatever form that takes. That doesn’t mean that their failure to do so should be a federal crime. That’s not the solution.

Rich white people have always been able to buy their way out of consequences. Trump is the living embodiment of that. Why would we assume that a law criminalizing COVID-19 negligence would be fairly applied to prosecute people like him?

A better issue to focus on would be the GOP’s obsession with protecting companies from being sued by their sick employees who were put at risk by coming back to work without protection. https://www.vox.com/2020/7/29/21345228/liability-shield-mitch-mcconnell-republican-safe-to-work-act-gross-negligence

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