Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2001. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
UN Integrated Regional Information Networks - September 28, 2001
Judge Edwin Cameron, head of the Law Commission committee focusing on the issue, said that existing common laws could effectively be used against people who fail to have disclose their status while having unprotected sex, the 'Mail and Guardian' reported. "Part of our reasoning is: why create an additional statute that will stigmatise people further but will be ineffective?", he was reported as saying.
He added that it was likely that consensual sex in those circumstances could eventually be regarded as rape by the South African courts, following a Canadian ruling that the failure of a man to tell his female partner that he was HIV-positive, negated her consent to unprotected sex. He was quoted as saying the Canadian judgement "is likely to be followed in South Africa. When you have sexual intercourse with someone and put them at risk of transmitting something without disclosing that risk to them, then it voids their consent."
Under existing common law, knowingly exposing a person to HIV could be classified as assault, and infection of a sexual partner could be prosecuted as culpable homicide if the person dies or attempted murder if they do not, the report said.
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