Yorkshire Philosophical Society

Event Information

 Is There A Human Right to Health?

Professor Jonathan Wolff, Centre for Philosophy, Justice & Health, University College London

Third lecture in a series of three on the theme of Global Health

The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights asserts that each individual has a ‘right to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health’. Philosophers, to this day, have raised questions as to how this is to be understood, and some have argued that there is no human right to health, at least as understood in these terms. On the other hand, many health activists have found the idea of the human right to health highly beneficial in achieving progressive aims such as access to expensive medication for poor people. Should philosophers insist on conceptual purity even if it impedes social progress, or is it possible to use philosophical resources to strengthen rights-based campaigns?

Report

In 1948 the Universal Declaration of Human Rights aimed to codify a philosophy of legal rights across many cultures and philosophies. It led to international laws, upheld by the UN. However, even defining the civil and political rights of individuals in sovereign states was somewhat fraught. Both Article 25, on the right to health, and the second Covenant, on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, raised even more questions. What does the right to health mean, what, indeed, is health? Who has the duty to provide it? How can a poor state be expected to care for its citizens as expensively as a rich one?

The human right to fair and equal treatment in any sphere is subject to human rights law, but the constitutional right of the individual to health is different from the international human right. Health priority setting probably is not the business of states; the state should be responsible, rather, for the social determinants of health, eg: basic nutrition, housing, protection from pollution. Even a poor state can aim to improve these. It is Medicine that protects against the standard threats to health – common, serious, and remediable illness. Doctors, notoriously, often choose to medicalise ordinary conditions, thereby wasting resources and muddying the philosophical waters.

Useful references were made to many philosophers, including Jacques Maritain, Michael Marmot, Onora O’Neill, John Rawls, and Henry Shue.

Carole Smith

Further information

Jonathan Wolff is author of the book “The Human Right to Health” (Amnesty International Global Ethics Series)
To view this book in Amazon, click the link below:

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