Time to read
NAT is calling upon the European Union to provide for the first time explicit protection from discrimination for people living with HIV from the point of diagnosis.
The European Commission announced in July plans for a new European equality directive. The directive will ban discrimination on the grounds of age, disability, religion and sexual orientation but the current draft does not protect people living with HIV.
In the UK everyone living with HIV is protected, from the point of diagnosis, from discrimination under the 2005 Disability Discrimination Act. At the European level, HIV is not specifically addressed in an equality directive and the disability-related directive does not contain a definition of disability that explicitly includes HIV positive status. This leaves member states free either to protect people living with HIV from discrimination.
A petition supported by organisations from across the EU is available to view here [Editor: link no longer available], together with downloadable questions and answers supporting the case for protection from discrimination for people living with HIV.