Gay Marriage Ban May Increase HIV Infection Rates

Lately, there has been much news and controversy surrounding gay marriage and whether or not a state will choose to recognize this type of union. Politicians, church leaders, movie and television stars and bloggers have all risen up to either strongly support or fight legalizing gay marriage. Bans on gay marriage may also be causing other unforeseen health problems, according to a new study out of Emory University. Economists there have determined that these bans could also be responsible for an increase in HIV infection rates.

Data from this study has demonstrated that a ban on same-sex marriage raises the rate of HIV infection by four cases for every 100,000 people. This study is the first of its kind as it centers on the impact made on HIV infection rates as determined by society’s tolerance of homosexuals in the United States. Hugo Mialon, one of the economists working on the study states, “We found the effects of tolerance for gays on HIV to be statistically significant and robust – they hold up under a range of empirical models.” Andrew Francis, another economist on the study points at California’s recent decision by their Supreme Court to continue with a ban on same-sex marriage, “Laws on gay marriage are in flux and under debate. It’s a hot issue, and we are hoping that policymakers will take our findings into account.”

The data for the research was garnered from the General Social Survey. The GSS is a survey that has been distributed to the American population for the past forty years and has kept data on American attitudes towards various issues. Data from the GSS has shown that from the 1970s to the 1990s, Americans grew more tolerant of homosexuals, causing the HIV infection rate to go down one case for every 100,000 people; however, laws that have banned gay marriage has caused the HIV infection rate to go up four cases for every 100,000 people. Mialon states, “Intolerance is deadly. Bans on gay marriage codify intolerance, causing more gay people to shift to underground sexual behaviors that carry more risk.”

Mialon and Francis recently received an award for a paper they wrote last year (published in March 2008) that analyzed penalties people receive for transmitting HIV. The American Law and Economics Review named their paper the outstanding paper of the year. They utilized a game theory model to show that some state laws that deal with the transmission of HIV have not been very efficient at keeping HIV from spreading. One example they noted was the state of Georgia. Here, if a patient with HIV does not tell his or her sexual partner that they are HIV positive before engaging in sexual relations, it could be considered a felony which could be punishable with up to 30 years of time served in prison. In this case, it does not matter if the infected person practices safe sex (with condoms) or if the non-infected partner does not get infected. If, however, the infected person does not know they are HIV positive and they happen to transmit HIV to their partner, the law does not apply.