Should adult film studios or even content producers be held responsible if one or more of their actors contract HIV during a shoot?

Do content producer's model release contracts adequately provide protection from this?

Is it possible for someone to prove they contracted the virus from a specific shoot?

-typo-



Last edited by KC at Apr 16 2004, 08:38 PM

KC: What about the individual actor, who chooses to travel to a foreign country, have sex with an untested performer (possibly bareback, I don't know facts so this is SPECULATION) and then returns and works. While I think the studio may have some liability, the performer also has to have half a brain, ya know?

The rules are not tight enough to stop this type of thing. There is nothing to stop performers from testing clean today, going out and having unprotected sex tonight(non-performing, pick someone up in a bar), and then shooting one or two days later... are they clean?

I am not sure the studios can be blamed for reckless behavior of individual actors.

Alex

True, with some occupations there is definitely an increased health risks...

A Police officer shot in the line of duty
A Firefighter killed in a blaze
A High rise construction work that plunges to their death
A crab fisherman killed at sea...

I'm sure the list goes on and on.. The performer has some responsibility for agreeing to do a high risk job.

I'm wondering (in our litigous society) would a court think a studio is to blame for "unsafe work conditions" for their actors?

If a nurse at a hospital contracts HIV (through no direct fault of her own... Simply doing her job as it was intended), is the hospital liable? I'm not talking about a nurse accidentally pricking herself with an infected needle... imagine if she did her job as intended, but still contracted it at work.

The problem would be in proving the model caught it from a particular shoot. But if you work in a high risk job for the money you take the risk yourself.

However in the US we know they love to sue.

yes, they should, and board owners should be liable for the posts too!
;-)))

I dunno...but I beleive I caught AIDS reading GFY.....
;-)))

I dunno...but I beleive I caught AIDS reading GFY.....
;-)))[/b][/quote]
I couldn't catch anything at gfy, except for the score of the lakers game

True, with some occupations there is definitely an increased health risks...

A Police officer shot in the line of duty
A Firefighter killed in a blaze
A High rise construction work that plunges to their death
A crab fisherman killed at sea...

I'm sure the list goes on and on.. The performer has some responsibility for agreeing to do a high risk job.

I'm wondering (in our litigous society) would a court think a studio is to blame for "unsafe work conditions" for their actors?

If a nurse at a hospital contracts HIV (through no direct fault of her own... Simply doing her job as it was intended), is the hospital liable? I'm not talking about a nurse accidentally pricking herself with an infected needle... imagine if she did her job as intended, but still contracted it at work.[/b][/quote]
Re hospitals and health care workers - it most assuredly has happened. Most of those cases get settled (unless the plaintiff gets greedy) before it gets near a courtroom, but yeah, a hospital can be held accountable for inadequate safety measures, unsafe working conditions, etc., that caused or helped to cause the conditions that lead to the infection.

As far as the studios ... if they lie and say "so&so was tested and is clean" when they have outdated or no documentation, I suppose they could. Same goes for knowingly allowing an infected person to participate in a shoot without the knowledge of the other person/persons.

How many producers have pockets deep enough to make it worth the while of a plantiff to go after?

I have some even scarier thoughts that I'm almost hesitant to post (think of deep pockets and exclusive shoots, or the sort of folks that provided some of the legal help that the women suing Clinton got).

These are very interesting questions.

I wonder how many hungry attorneys are thinking about possible causes of action.

I don't shoot content but if I did I would be absolutely sure to get on tape before shooting a hardcore scene having the performers signing the model release and agreeing they have looked over their fellow performers test and are satisfied with the results and comfortable with the scene and their fellow performers(s) enough to go through with it.

That way you have them on tape looking at the documents and agreeing to take the risks.

The only thing I caught there was aggravation and a case of eye-rolling.