HIV-positive Man Admits to Going on Sex Spree

An HIV-infected taxi driver had indiscriminate sexual relations with scores of women, police in Jecheon, South Chungcheong Province, said yesterday.

Though the 26-year-old man “Jeon” is simply an HIV carrier and does not have AIDS, the incident has exposed lax management of the deadly disease by health authorities.

He was arrested Wednesday for habitually stealing women’s underwear. After his arrest, police discovered he has HIV.

Jeon tested positive for HIV in June 2003 when he took a physical before entering military service, according to police.

The Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirmed his condition two months later and placed him under monitoring by Jecheon Health Center.

He got a job as a taxi driver afterwards and had sex with bar girls and drunk female passengers by luring them to his house for nearly six years. He has also captured sex scenes on his cell phone camera.

Police said he neither told his sex partners of his infection nor used contraceptives.

A police search of his house found packets of medicine along with women’s underwear. Police grilled Jeon on what the medicine was for and he confessed to being HIV-positive.

Police sought an arrest warrant for him yesterday for violating an AIDS prevention law and began tracking the women who had sex with him.

According to health authorities, however, chances are low that his sex partners were infected with the deadly virus.

Since he was put under monitoring, he has got counseling and medical checkups 30 times and taken regular medication. This means he is as healthy as an ordinary person, a source at the disease control center said.

Domestic law only prohibits those who are HIV-positive from working at entertainment establishments that require regular medical checkups of their employees. Calls are rising for authorities to draw up countermeasures to control the jobs and private lives of HIV-positive people.

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