Reproductive Health Law: Where Next, After Cairo and Beijing?

Abstract

PIP: This paper analyzes the Programme of Action of the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) and the Platform for Action of the 1995 Fourth World Conference on Women (FWCW) to explicate the principles contained in these documents that might be used to develop a national reproductive health law. The introductory section of the paper describes how the use of human rights principles to advance reproductive health and empower women has grown and reprints the ICPD definition of reproductive health as well as the portion of the FWCW Platform that links women's human rights and reproductive health. The next section shows how the following human rights can be applied to an effort to protect reproductive interests: 1) the right to life and survival (protection from pregnancy-related death); 2) the right to liberty and security of the person (protection from restrictive or coercive abortion policies, from restricted or coercive contraception and sexual sterilization, and from female genital mutilation as well as protection of the right to a private life); 3) the right to the highest attainable standard of health (violated by the unmet need for family planning); 4) the right to the benefits of scientific progress; 5) the right to receive and impart information; and 6) the right to nondiscrimination on the basis of sex, age, or disability. The final section of the paper discusses how an alliance of health and legal professionals could lobby governments to enact reproductive health laws that enforce human rights and are accompanied by a reproductive rights impact assessment of relevant policies, ethical codes for health practitioners, and compliance mechanisms.