Please note that Governor Brown of California has just signed a bill that seems patently immoral, making it a misdemeanor rather than a felony for HIV-infected men to knowingly have anal intercourse with other men, without the receptive partner's knowledge or consent.  This is murder by any other name.

When I was teaching in Berkeley, I taught young gay graduate students, some of them complaining that they were targeted by "predatory" older gays.  I saw some of them develop AIDS and one young man getting sicker until he was near death.

Please note that TheConversation.com (an Australian academic site) is also emphasizing the role of penile-anal penetration as a cause of anal cancer, another major risk factor that could be controlled.

Since the penile-anal viral pathway is the main infectious vector for HIV-AIDS, plus other STDs, the California Legislature has just legalized endangerment and very possibly murder by sexual intercourse.  This is criminal irresponsibility on the part of the Legislature, especially because some gay men are extremely active sexually, having multiple encounters with other men in a matter of days.  Some of this behavior looks addictive, with an escalating pattern of frequency and extremity of sexual acts, which also give rise to severe sado-masochistic activities. Because blood-to-blood contact is the most dangerous viral transmission pathway, and because the anus is not physiologically protected by mucus and epithelial layers, and because the act in question often causes bleeding, the increased danger should be obvious.

When these acts knowingly cause loss of life or serious disease, the civil law has traditionally treated them as prosecutable murder or manslaughter.  The California Legislature has decriminalized what is a plain and obvious crime.

In Africa, where some women favor receptive anal penetration for birth control purposes, professional female prostitutes are commonly infected with AIDS and die.  The rate of AIDS is therefore significantly higher in Africa than in wealthier industrialized countries.  It is also noteworthy that Cuba escaped the AIDS crisis because Fidel Castro imposed a traditional medical quarantine on HIV carriers, a dictatorial action that no democratic country has been willing to imitate.

In richer industrialized countries, the major danger is from transmission by gay carriers to gay victims, who are often much younger and more ignorant.  The San Francisco Chronicle has reported "bug chasing" parties among gay men, where a small group of men will have a party with at least one known HIV carrier.

So this is not a trivial public health issue, and the California Legislature and Governor Brown are being criminally irresponsible – a fact they must know.