About that HIV Discrimination Case, Let’s Be Patient
As expected, the judge issued a ruling in the HIV job discrimination case on Friday:
A Chinese court ruled Friday against the defendant in the country’s first lawsuit over employment discrimination against people who are HIV-positive[.]
The defendant, identified only by the nickname “Little Wu,” brought the suit in the eastern city of Anqing after being refused a teaching job because he tested positive for the virus that causes AIDS.
Anqing’s Yinjiang District Court ruled the city education bureau had correctly followed public service health standards in assessing his unsuitability for the position[.] (Associated Press)
A lot of folks, including me, are very disappointed by this ruling. However, let’s keep a couple things in mind.
First, the case involved a conflict between two different laws. One is a set of health standards for public servants. The other is a national law that addresses discrimination of individuals with certain diseases.
So we had a disagreement between two different laws. The judge in this action went with the public service standard instead of the discrimination rules.
This is going to be bumped up to the next level. The court of first instance was a district court (the lowest level in China’s judicial system), so getting some clarification from higher up is probably just as well anyway.
Second, remember that just getting this case heard was a huge step. This was the point I made earlier this year:
This is positive news in most respects. The standard operating procedure for Chinese courts up until now is to dismiss these discrimination cases, including HIV. We’ve seen some very positive trends with sexual harassment over the past few years, and now perhaps HIV cases will begin to be accepted by judges. The Central Government has, via legal reform in 2006, made their intentions clear that such cases should be taken seriously.
By hearing the case, the issue was indeed taken seriously. Now we’ll see what we get out of an appellate hearing. The law in question only dates back to 2006, and this has been touted as the first case of its kind. Even if the appellate court affirms the district court’s ruling, progress is being made here.
Let’s be patient and acknowledge the progress that this represents. I say this because not everyone seems to understand the big picture here. As usual, one of my favorite US politics blogs uses this ruling for some good old fashioned China bashing:1
As eager as the government is to move into the modern world in some areas, they remain hopelessly backwards in so many other ways. Whether it’s discriminating against an HIV-positive teacher or imprisoning activists in mental institutions, China has a long way to go. Why is it that Western politicians are so casual about overlooking these issues? It’s not that we don’t hear a few chirps on occasion, enough to give lip service, but Western leaders are much too fearful of calling out these problems. (Americablog)
{Sigh}
Listen up. “The government” (whatever that means) is not discriminating against anyone. In fact, the central government expressly passed a law in 2006 that arguably makes discrimination illegal. We now have some legal inconsistencies to sort out, but progress is being made. This local ruling is in no way an expression of where the country is on this issue at the moment, and suggesting that it is reveals a deep misunderstanding of how this country works.
Heaven forbid a blogger should actually read an article or two before making a blanket condemnation of an entire country.
Is this guy really saying that Western leaders should raise this issue during bilateral negotiations? That’s laughable. Not only is it a domestic legal issue, but things are moving in the right direction. Should China complain to the US every time someone in LA gets beaten up by a cop?
I’m getting tired of this sort of ignorant garbage. The fact that it’s coming from one of my favorite blogs makes it even worse.
________________________________
- Always the same guy, too. He seems to have an irrational bug up his ass about China.[↩]
________________________________
I think there’s an important difference between HBV and HIV infections: HBV can be vaccinated and is indeed widely vaccinated in China, while there’s no effective HIV vaccin available.
In light of this, I’m wondering who’s supposed to protect the school kids from being infected? I know HIV does not spread via air or food etc but still, blood and feces are infectious. Is it wise to unnecessarily expose the children who have neither the maturity, the knowledge nor the experience to protect themselves? They have rights too.
And why is it a step forward to lift some of the bans over HIV+ people while keeping the bans are not? Various groups of people all have their rights to protect and it’s usually the practicality that prevails. If the most social and cost effective way to balance these rights is to restrict certain rights from certain people, I’d say it’s a step forward to restrict their rights until the situation changes and the balance shifts. I’d rather frame such issues as a balance of rights in face of reality. There isn’t always a right or wrong answer, lest a moral ground to defend.
If there were a plausible infection vector to point to for HIV, I’d be more sympathetic to that argument. I just don’t see how blood/feces from an HIV+ teacher would find its way into a students’ open wound. If that is indeed the case, then why the discrimination?
I doubt your legal mindset of “innocent until proven guilty” can appropriately apply to infectious diseases and public health, where the motto seems to be “you can never be too cautious”. In case of the infection vector, I’m not a Chinese public health experts, nor are you. I don’t think I have a valid position here to defend, and honestly can’t see how you have one. If the public policy depends on the public health arguments, I’d rather leave the issues to the experts in that area rather than being influenced by activists, lawyers, moralists, religious groups, and politicians etc who have no scientific expertise whatsoever in what they advocate/refute.
On thing is clear to me, though, that the HIV infection pattern in China is quite different from that in the west, so the experience gained elsewhere may not apply. That, again, should be left for the expert in the area to decide.
Sure, I’ll always defer to an expert. If you’ve read something from one that has studied the risks we have been talking about, I’d like to see that.
This kind of presumption about safety goes both ways. I remember back in the 80s/90s when there was genuine hysteria about HIV and transmission, and only later did we find out that a lot of the “reasonable precautions” were being used to discriminate.
Infection patterns may be different in China, but there are only so many ways one can get infected, and I believe these have been studied a whole lot over the years. Studies have been done, for example, about transmission by health workers, dentists, etc. I don’t think the fundamental mechanics of this stuff (e.g. needle sticks) can vary by country.
I’m all for public health and safety, but I’d like to know that we’re basing policy on solid grounds and not unwarranted fear.
I’d be very careful not to fall into the hindsight bias when talking about reasonable precautions being abused to discriminate, and make a clear distinction between the principles of the policy, the policy itself, some of its specifics, and the implementation and the implementers of the policy.
Most scientists I know of are quite modest about what they know and generous on the know unknowns. They are also very careful about extrapolating conjectures. I think that’s the right attitude towards the nature and the science. Until the thorough research is completed and the domain experts reach the consensus, I wouldn’t make allegations on certain precautions measures in place as being unwarranted. That, to me, is a clear sign of non scientist trespassing science topics.
Agree with all that. I would be surprised, though, if the science has not already been settled on this question. We’ve been living with this disease for decades now.
If you read any conclusive result saying HIV+ teachers do not pose as a health risk to schoolchildren please let me know. On the other hand, just take two minutes to peruse the science literature you’d have a totally different idea on what the scientists can offer. Take one example, the condom use and HIV infection. Read here: http://www.cdc.gov/hiv/resources/qa/prevention.htm
It says nothing about male-male condom usage, because there’s no established, statistically significant and verifiable epidemiologic study on that topic and it would be scientifically irresponsible to extrapolate the heterosexual infection conclusion to male-male intercourse.
It also clearly says that “that condom use cannot provide absolute protection against HIV”. Just a little bit math would show you that even if condom usage reduce the infection rate to only 0.01%, 300 intercourse later your chance of being infected rise to 3% (which is 1-0.9999^300). “Weller & Davis reported a revised estimate of an 80% reduction in risk with a range of 35–94%”, is that good enough for you? I know it’s not for me to take in a HIV+ partner. Scientists do know that by using condom the infection rate would be quite low for HIV to become a major epidemic, but that’s about what they know and have reached consensus about. Anything beyond that is pure speculation.
Again, I think common sense would suggest that modes of transmission in the schoolyard are going to result in much lower incidence of infection than sexual intercourse, protected or not.
Anyway, I really don’t have any more specifics to throw out on this issue . . .