A woman in Austria was found guilty of grossly negligent homicide Thursday after a judge ruled she had fatally infected her neighbor with Covid in 2021.
On Thursday the woman was issued a four months’ suspended imprisonment sentence and fined $886.75 for grossly negligent homicide, according to Newsweek.
The name of the defendant and the deceased have not been released due to privacy regulations in Austria.
“The victim, who was also a cancer patient, died of pneumonia that was caused by the coronavirus, according to Austrian news agency APA. A virological report showed that the virus DNA matched both the deceased and the 54-year-old woman, proving that the defendant ‘almost 100 percent’ transmitted it, an expert told the court,” the AP said on Friday.
‘Almost’ 100 percent was apparently enough to convict the woman.
It should also be noted that the facts of the case indicate it is possible the defendant’s infection spread to the deceased through unintentional means, such as through a door gap or air duct, as it is the deceased’s family who alleges the contact, something the defendant denies.
The deceased’s family reportedly told the judge that there had been ‘contact’ between the defendant and the deceased in a stairwell on December 21, 2021, after the defendant would have allegedly known she had Covid. The defendant denied the contact in the stairwell, saying she was too sick to get out of bed and assumed she had bronchitis, something she often got each year, the AP reported on Friday.
It is not clear if the nature of the alleged ‘contact’ was for innocent conversation, maliciously spreading the virus, or just passing by, as may happen when checking the mail, for example.
The defendant’s physician told police that she tested positive for Covid and that the defendant told the doctor that she “certainly won’t let herself be locked up” after getting news of the result, according to the AP.
The precedent set with this case and other potential cases similar to this is a dangerous one. It criminalizes normal human behavior following a positive test result and goes so far as to make the sick into murderers, even if they infect others unintentionally.
It should be noted that Covid rapid tests have a massive false positive rate, the same test that the doctor said the woman tested positive with. The Covid PCR test is also subject to false positive results as well.
Dr. Rochelle Walensky discusses new questions about COVID rapid tests amid rising cases. @CDCDirector#COVID19#Omicronhttps://t.co/kaBqUH9xCY pic.twitter.com/j2fTMx2f3s
— Good Morning America (@GMA) December 29, 2021