Gender, Health and Stigma: Living With HIV under Criminalization in Canada


Chris Tatham, University of Guelph

This paper examines how the impacts of HIV criminalization in Canada (the criminalization of non-disclosure of HIV) upon people living with HIV varies along of gender. The key themes that emerge from the accounts of the 75 people living with HIV in the study include how the law facilitates their potential for social exploitation (in terms of increased risk of violence after disclosure, and decreased control over condom use), the impact of the law upon sexual and romantic relationships (changing both the form of their relationships, and the gendered power dynamics within them), as well as their treatment by the criminal justice system itself (through the linking of HIV status with presumed guilt). A notable key finding is that women in the study experience criminalization through the lens of motherhood – regardless of whether they have children. Overall, this paper posits that the non-disclosure law, which was heralded as being designed to ‘protect women’ (Krusi 2018), does indeed do the opposite.

This paper will be presented at the following session: