Ireland: High Court rules that teenager's HIV need not be disclosed to woman

[Jim Allen]

Its a first of a kind case and ruling for Irish courts.

i'm glad for the young man that the judge ruled his status does not need to be disclosed but the stress of having such a case brought up must have been tremendous strain for such a young person to go through and it seems totally unjustified.   

Bizarre case to start with, the age of consent in Ireland is 17, so if they were sexual active i find it overbearing for the agency to think they would have the right to get involved in the first place with regards to what happens in the bedroom between of two consenting sexual partners.

The background in short to this case is its regarding 2 teenagers both aged 17, the young man is under the care  of the Child and Family Agency and has been living with HIV from birth, as the agency believe he is sexually active they brought a case to court to allow the doctor to disclose his HIV status to the young woman. The young man claims they are only friends.

The ruling was delivered last month but was published online yesterday. It described the order being sought to breach the individual’s confidentiality as “unprecedented in the Irish courts”.

The court determined that the appropriate test to apply to determine whether patient confidentiality should be breached is whether:

on the balance of probabilities, the failure to breach patient confidentiality creates a significant risk of death or very serious harm to an innocent third party.

In this case, the High Court determined that this test was not passed to justify the breach of confidentiality.

The court decided that the CFA had not established on the balance of probabilities that the young man was having unprotected sexual intercourse with the young woman.

The court also found that even if the young woman was having unprotected sex with the young man and assumed all the risks that are associated with unprotected sex, the court’s view was that the risk of HIV infection in such circumstances was somewhere in the region of 0.04%.

This was based on medical evidence which stated this could be reduced by the use of condoms.

The court concluded that if the two were having sex, which is denied, the man would have have to fail to take his antiretroviral drugs consistently for the woman to contract HIV.

The court also noted that HIV is not a terminal illness and found that there is “no risk of death or very serious harm” to the young woman.

The court also found that in this case the young woman is not “an innocent third party”.

“Not in a moral sense, but in the sense that she is willingly undertaking the risk of contracting communicable diseases by having unprotected sex,” ruled Justice Michael Twomey.

Full Story:
http://www.thejournal.ie/high-court-hiv-case-3896531-Mar2018/

[kentfrat1783]

That is crazy. Basically CPS couldn’t tell the woman so they got the courts involved?  Sure seems like an overreach to me. Especially since both denied having sex. How about just have the sex talk and ways to have safe sex?  In the US they are taking out the sex talk and ways to have safe sex and we are already seeing the rates of HIV and STD’s increase.

Then again I feel bad for the young man. I am sure he’s had a hard life and this just makes it harder. Hope this came out correct.

I’ve learned since my Dx it is just another condition and is manageable and easy to take the pill (well me pills for the time being).

[Jim Allen]

That is crazy. Basically CPS couldn’t tell the woman so they got the courts involved?  Sure seems like an overreach to me

Yup and agreed.
The CPS getting involved like this simply does more harm than good.

How about just have the sex talk and ways to have safe sex?  In the US they are taking out the sex talk and ways to have safe sex and we are already seeing the rates of HIV and STD’s increase.

Agreed and better sex education is key for young people, at the age of 17 ideally they would have had correct and comprehensive sex education a lot sooner, years ago and than there would not be as much as an issue for concern.

Not sure about the US but the problem here with sex education (I feel) is its still way too limited fashion, the limit and framework being set by the factors such as " Its Ireland, Catholics, the Church directly runs and/or controls 97% of all the schools ...  need say more.   

I’ve learned since my Dx it is just another condition and is manageable and easy to take the pill (well me pills for the time being).

Glad to hear it 

[Jim Allen]

Reading the case again in full I think the doctor who was supporting the case should be deeply ashamed of themselves for ever doing so.

Hope they learned a (medical) lesson from the ruling as well.

Jim

[Jim Allen]

Following the high court case, a very popular and award winning radio show had the below debate topic:

""Should people living with HIV be legally forced to disclose their diagnosis?""

There was a lot of talk from people on why we should be legally forced to disclose  and I listened and recorded a part of the show

(Ill link the full official podcast when its made available)

Normally it would not bother me but the conversation was confusing TaSP with PrEP placing TaSP at 86% effective and not surprisingly has a few other misconceptions.

So I decided to text the show asking them if they wanted someone living with HIV to join the conversation? They accepted called me back and I joined in at
about 22 +- mins into this recording

https://drive.google.com/file/d/16bscgl4bLdgP8hD0Xr5sevT0QoOBPff9/view

Jim

P.S
- Note its adult content so "listener discretion is advised"

[CaveyUK]

Excellent stuff Jim - really well articulated.

The host wasn't too bad either. Although wish he had stuck on the subject of travel restrictions a bit more, because obviously now there is no immigration rules in the US for HIV, and theres nothing stopping travel to places like Canada and Australia although permanent residency, unless you are related to a native, is still likely to be refused.

I did skip to your bit, so probably missed some stuff that would make me shout at the radio

[Jim Allen]

Thanks.

I have to say speaking on the Radio is very different from doing it in person in front of an audience and doing it on the fly as this was, I found it more difficult than speaking at a planned event.

Indeed, the host did try his best to keep things well balanced in all fairness to him. Also I thought it was very honest of him to share his story of washing his hands (30 odd years ago) after shaking the hands of someone living with HIV and how he knows better today than he did than.

On the travel ban, yeah ran out of time unfortunately because I would have liked to have said that Australia is not a flat out ban anymore

Jim

[Ptrk3]

Terrific, Jim!  Really good.  You have a fine voice for radio.  Thanks very much for sharing! Very articulate and on point, no nervousness detected at all.  Congratulations on a job well done. 

[Jim Allen]

Thanks, appreciate the kind comments.

I did get some slack from the GF about calling her the "office squeeze" . It totally slipped my mind that she was listing to the radio show ... But as she is German I just told her its a term of endearment

[leatherman]

OMG. where is this great radio station?! For all that I bemoan that there is never any coverage of HIV in the media, this was a really great broadcast! I don't think I'll ever hear this kind of coverage in South Carolina. Burning pitchforks would be marching on the station. LOL

What a great talk! You did awesome!! I hope I sound half as good as you do when I'm rattling off facts and stories about PrEP/TasP. I could really hear the host and callers absorb that info you gave them. More minds educated! Don't fret about what you didn't get to say. You said a bunch for them to process. LOL

again, great work!


I should disclose that I skipped some of the conversation too. I could feel my blood pressure rising while that one guy was confusing himself and the host with his notions about pep, prep, and tasp. OH! and I skipped through the commercials too. LOL

[Jim Allen]

 

Thanks, really appreciate it.

Its a popular Irish FM radio show that also is broadcasted live on facebook

I could feel my blood pressure rising while that one guy was confusing himself and the host with his notions about pep, prep, and tasp.

Me too  when they started to mix the PrEP vs TaSP (U=U) facts and the host saying there was a 14% risk left of transmission based on a PrEP study is when I texted them asking if they wanted someone living with HIV to join the debate.

If you have Facebook the show has a Facebook page, its a nightly show Monday - Thursday and HIV does come up from time to time whenever its has been in the news.

*Warning its tends to be extreme topics*
On the night i was called it was 45 mins into the full recording of the show the topic were HIV and the next topic is the WW2 and a Nazi's that recently passed away in his 90's, followed by "Would you or have you bought stolen goods"

FB
https://www.facebook.com/NiallBoylanAtNight

FB recording last night
https://www.facebook.com/NiallBoylanAtNight/videos/1703517806390877/

Website:
http://www.theniallboylanshow.com/

[kentfrat1783]

I listened to the radio broadcast last night before I went to bed and I thought it was great.  What I thought was great was that others were at least open to listening.  That helps so much. 

I still wonder what others would think of me if I came out to them.  There is still the "typical" stigma to it in the area I live in the US. 

Things have came so long but with any issue we still have so much to go. 

[Jim Allen]

Yeah stigma is not going anywhere soon, I mean there will always be the uneducated and ignorance in the world.

I still believe though that it's getting better and in the future with more people open about their HIV status and education things will continue to improve for all of us.

Jim

[OneTampa]

Excellent Presentation Jim!

You came across as authentic and knowledgeable.  You also have a
nice voice with great timbre, elocution and tone with your regional accent.

Also agree with comments from other Board Members.

Thank you!

OT

[awakening]

Thanks for your advocacy. Your points were very well articulated.

[Jim Allen]

Thanks OT & Awakening for the kind words, I really appreciate it.

The one good thing for myself from this, is I got over any minor jitters i still had with regards to my bake sale and Living with HIV & Stigma talk at work upcoming this April.

Jim 

[CaveyUK]

you can start your talk by mentioning how you intervened in a major radio talk show due to some of the misinformation being relayed....