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Co-Opting the Health and Human Rights Movement

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2021

Peter D. Jacobson  and
Soheil Soliman
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Extract

Public health is concerned with how to improve the population’s health. At times, though, actions to improve the community’s health may collide with individual civil rights. For example, a public health response to a bioterrorism attack, such as smallpox, may require relaxing an individual’s due process protections to prevent the smallpox from spreading. This tension lies at the heart of public health policy. It also must be considered in discussing the concept of human rights in health.

Proponents of incorporating the concept of human rights in health emphasize the importance of both individual rights and collective rights. They argue that observing human rights is not only consistent with broad public health goals, but necessary to their attainment. To many human rights advocates, the concept is not limited to protecting against governmental intrusion. Accordingly, they emphasize the government’s obligation to promote attainment of human rights by, for instance, providing adequate health care.

Type
Article
Information
Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics , Volume 30 , Issue 4 , Winter 2002 , pp. 705 - 715
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of Law, Medicine and Ethics 2002

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References

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