Friday 6 March 2009

(Not) Being Informed of HIV/AIDS

For health law afficionados, I can recommend yesterday's Court judgment in the case of Colak and Tsakiridis v. Germany. Ms Colak complained about the fact that she had not been informed by her doctor that her partner was suffering from AIDS (a fact the partner had explicitly asked the doctor not to disclose). Only when the partner died, was it revealed to Ms Colak that he had died of AIDS. Not much later she was diagnosed as HIV positive. She did not receive any damages on the national level, amongst others because an expert held that it was probable that the applicant had already been infected before her partner told their common doctor. The Court assesed the case from the perspective of Article 2 (right to life), Article 8 (right to respect for private life), and Article 6 ECHR (right to a fair trial). No violations of the Convention were found.