The right to health
December 2005
The majority of the BMA’s work in health and human rights has been in relation to the violation of civil and political rights. This has looked at both the violations of the fundamental rights of health professionals, and in the involvement of health professionals in the violation of the rights of others. This has been in keeping with the approach of leading human rights organisations such as Amnesty International. More recently however, increasing attention has been focussed on the economic, social and cultural rights, including the ‘right to health’.
Launch of high level statement on the ‘right to health’
On the 9th of December 2005 the BMA, in association with Essex University and Realizing Rights: Ethical Globalization Initiative, hosted the launch of a high level statement on the right to health. Mary Robinson, former President of Ireland and former United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights was in attendance, as was Paul Hunt, UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Health, and Dr Michael Wilks, Chair of the BMA’s Ethics Committee. The goal of the launch was to raise the profile of the right to health amongst leading policy makers, and to ensure that health is given more priority in programs to tackle poverty.
Read more here - www.eginitiative.org/.
Read more here - www.ohchr.org/english/issues/health/right/.
Right to Health handbook
In association with the Commonwealth Medical Trust (COMMAT) and the BMA’s International Department, and drawing on the BMA’s Strategic Grant Agreement financing from the UK’s Department for International Development, the BMA is sponsoring the development of a pocket-size handbook on the right to health. Intended as a brief, practical introduction to the meaning and content of the right to health, the handbook is intended for a global health professional audience.
The handbook is being drafted by Dr Judith Asher and will draw significantly on the earlier COMMAT handbook The Right to Health: a Resource Manual for NGOs.
A copy of this resource manual is available here at http://oldsite.commat.org/Medical%20Ethics%20and%20Right%20to%20Health/Right%20to%20Health/pdf/Right_to_health_www.pdf.