8/14/2019 Health as a Basic Human Right

1/2

Health as a Basic HumanRight

In exploring the connection between health and human rights,we propose three relationships, each of which focuses on anmportant aspect of this critical linkage.

The first relationship, which can be diagrammed simply as H

HR concerns the potential impacts of health policies,

programs, and practices on human rights.

Recognition of the complementarily of public health goals and

human rights norms can lead to more effective health policiesand programs.

The challenge is to negotiate the optimal balance between

promoting and protecting public health and promoting andprotecting human rights.

The second relationship, which can be diagrammed, equally

simply as H HR, expresses the idea that violations or lack offulfillment of any and all human rights have negative effectson physical, mental, and social well-being (health).

This is true in peacetime and of course in times of conflict and

extreme political repression.

The third relationship, which can be diagrammed as H HR, conveys the idea of inextricable connection.

The central idea of the health and human rights movement is

that health and human rights act in synergy.

Promoting and protecting health requires explicit and concrete

efforts to promote and protect human rights and dignity, andgreater fulfillment of human rights necessitates soundattention to health and to its societal determinants.

The Public Health Human Rights Dialogue

Public health and human rights can be considered as twodifferent, often complementary and occasionally conflicting ways ofooking at the world. Even when they address similar or evendentical problems, their language and underlying assumptionsmay differ.

Public health is concerned with promoting and protectinghealth in other words, physical, mental, and social well-being and with preventing or reducing morbidity (illness, disability, orsuffering) and premature mortality. A fundamental yet oftenunstated assumption is that public health seeks the greatest goodfor the greatest number.

Human rights are concerned with promoting and protectingthe well-being of individuals by ensuring respect for individualrights and dignity. A central concern in human rights is the ethicalprinciple of autonomy. It is therefore inevitable that some tensionwill emerge between public health and human rights perspectivesand approaches to promoting human well-being

For example:

At times, an individual may be considered dangerous forthe health of the larger group. (e.g. a person withtuberculosis can infect contacts; the intoxicated drivermay cause automobile crashes that endanger others.)The public health response to these situations has often

been to constrain the individual in order to protectgroup.

Certain public health measures, proposed on the bof excellent scientific data )e.g., adding iodine to tasalt to prevent iodine efficiency and cretinism), may or eliminate individual choice and also have some effects and costs.

Human rights and public health have increasingly recognthe vital role of the societal environment to both health and

realization of human rights.

Even while many individuals do what they can to be hea(for example, eating well and avoiding tobacco smoking), thealth will be strongly influenced by a polluted environmdangerous work conditions or lack of safe drinking water. Similthe freedom to make ones own decisions depends on conditsuch as having sufficient income, a place to live, and good heaIn turn, these factors are heavily influenced by whether or noindividual belongs to a group that suffers discrimination. Thusrelationship between the individual and the society is mcomplex than it may initially appear.

Human rights and public health are complementary approaches, and languages, to address

advance human well being.

The human rights approach to seek to describe and

promote and protect the societal prerequisites for huwell being in which an individual can achieve his or hepotential.

Health concerns are the physical, mental, and social wbeing of individuals.

Public health can be defined as ensuring the conditionwhich people can be healthy. The core of public he

knowledge, based on research and experience, is that blendindividual and societal level factors are involved in determihealth status. For many, if not most people, the societal contethe major determinant of vulnerability to preventable disedisability, and premature death.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights cornerstone document of modern human rights throughfocus on the societal-level determinants of well-being addressepanoply of public health issues and concerns, even thoughword health itself appears only once in the document.

The focus of the universal Declaration on these societal-l

health determinants provides public health with a framew

vocabulary, and guidance for analysis and direct respothat may ultimately prove more useful to promote puhealth than frameworks inherited from biochemical and puhealth traditions.

From a human rights perspective, interest in health primarily focused on governmental actions taken in the nampublic health and their impact on the rights enshrinedinternational human rights law. Most actions taken in the nampublic health care are carried out under the aegis of governmeauthority and responsibility. Most are actually performedgovernmental agencies, and others are indirectly supported organized by governmental funding and regulation. Recognitiothe dependency of fulfillment of human rights provides a

8/14/2019 Health as a Basic Human Right

2/2

approach to monitoring governmental responsibility andaccountability for rights affecting health.

What is the Human Right to Health?

Every woman, man, youth and child has the human right to thehighest attainable standard of physical and mental health, withoutdiscrimination of any kind. Enjoyment of the human right to health is vital toall aspects of a person's life and well-being, and is crucial to the realizationof many other fundamental human rights and freedoms.

The Human Rights to Health

Human Rights relating to health are set out in basic human rights treatiesand include:

The human right to the highest attainable standard of physicaland mental health, including reproductive and sexual health.

The human right to equal access to adequate health care andhealth-related services, regardless of sex, race, or other status.

The human right to equitable distribution of food.

The human right to access to safe drinking water and sanitation.

The human right to an adequate standard of living and adequatehousing.

The human right to a safe and healthy environment.

The human right to a safe and healthy workplace and toadequate protection for pregnant women in work proven to beharmful to them.

The human right to freedom from discrimination anddiscriminatory social practices, including female genitalmutilation, prenatal gender selection, and female infanticide.

The human right to education and access to information relatingto health, including reproductive health and family planning toenable couples and individuals to decide freely and responsiblyall matters of reproduction and sexuality.

The human right of the child to an environment appropriate forphysical and mental development.

Governments' Obligations to Ensuring the Human Rightto Health

"Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for ...health and well-being of himself and his family, including food,clothing, housing, medical care and the right to security in theevent of ... sickness, disability.... Motherhood and childhood areentitled to special care and assistance...."

--Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 25

"States Parties recognize the right of the child to the enjoyment ofthe highest attainable standard of health and to facilities for thetreatment of illness and rehabilitation of health...."

--Convention on the Rights of the Child, Article 24

Governments' Commitments to Ensuring the HumanRight to Health

"Health and development are intimately interconnected. Bothnsufficient development leading to poverty and inappropriatedevelopment ... can result in severe environmental healthproblems.... The primary health needs of the world's population ...are integral to the achievement of the goals of sustainabledevelopment and primary environmental care.... Major goals ... Bythe year 2000 ... eliminate guinea worm disease...; eradicate polio;By 1995 ... reduce measles deaths by 95 per cent...; ensure

universal access to safe drinking water and ... sanitary measures

of excreta disposal...; By the year 2000 [reduce] the numbedeaths from childhood diarrhea ... by 50 to 70 per cent..."

-- Agenda 21,Chapter 6, paras. 1 and 12

"Everyone has the right to the enjoyment of the highest attainstandard of physical and mental health. States should takeappropriate measures to ensure, on a basis of equality of men women, universal access to health-care services, including threlated to reproductive health care.... The role of womenprimary custodians of family health should be recognized supported. Access to basic health care, expanded heeducation, the availability of simple cost-effective remedieshould be provided...."

--Cairo Programme of Action, Principle 8 and p8.6

"Human health and quality of life are at the centre of the effodevelop sustainable human settlements. We ... commit ourseto ... the goals of universal and equal access to ... the highattainable standard of physical, mental and environmental heand the equal access of all to primary health care, maparticular efforts to rectify inequalities relating to social economic conditions ..., without distinction as to race, natiorigin, gender, age, or disability. Good health throughout the

span of every man and woman, good health for every child ...fundamental to ensuring that people of all ages are able tparticipate fully in the social, economic and political processehuman settlements .... Sustainable human settlements depend... policies ... to provide access to food and nutrition, safe drinwater, sanitation, and universal access to the widest rangprimary health-care services...; to eradicate major diseases take a heavy toll of human lives, particularly childhood diseasecreate safe places to work and live; and to protect environment.... Measures to prevent ill health and disease areimportant as the availability of appropriate medical treatment care. It is therefore essential to take a holistic approach to heawhereby both prevention and care are placed within the contexenvironmental policy...."

--Habitat Agenda,