Prisoners Right to Healthcare, a European Perspective

2013 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 5-19 ◽  
Author(s):  
Henriette Roscam Abbing

Abstract The right to healthcare applies regardless of a person’s legal status. Prisoners have a right to a healthcare equivalent to the one in the community at large: access to medical care and preventive measures of good quality and costs covered. States have a positive duty to provide for appropriate healthcare in prison, including harm reduction policies (for instance health screening, vaccination and needle exchange). Denial of access to appropriate health facilities to prisoners and other detainees is likely to result in bodily harm, unnecessary morbidity and avoidable death. Essential elements of the social right to care for the health of prisoners are protected through the positive obligations individual human rights impose on States (e.g., the right to life, the prohibition of torture, degrading treatment and punishment, the right to liberty and the right to private life). Health related human rights standards for prison healthcare have been formulated over worldwide and in Europe. The Council of Europe’s Committee of Prevention of Torture monitors the situation of prisoners in Member States. Still, healthcare for prisoners falls short of what is required. Prison healthcare is an essential part of public health. A major involvement of the Minister of Health is indispensable.

2020 ◽  
Vol 26 (2) ◽  
pp. 255-261
Author(s):  
Ralitsa Voynova

AbstractIn a digital age when national borders are not a barrier to offenders, access to electronic databases, often located in several countries, is required for a thorough criminal investigation and the correct resolution of a large number of criminal cases. The collection of information stored by cloud and telecommunication service providers for criminal prosecution purposes inevitably addresses issues of personal rights and freedoms. The CJEU has clarified that any restriction on the right to private life and data protection must be consistent with the requirements of legality, necessity and proportionality provided for in EU law. This study analyzes the compliance of the latest EU legislative instruments on a transnational collection of electronic data tothe European human rights standards and the principles of criminal justice.


2017 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
pp. 33
Author(s):  
Vereno Brugiatelli

Man's ethical fulfilment often faces objective obstacles in the deprivation of rights. The negation of the recognition of certain fundamental rights, or worse, the radical misrecognition of man, which translates into different forms of violence, often artfully disguised both on an individual and collective level, produces devastating consequences in the private life of a person upsetting all forms of positive self-esteem. The recognition of human qualities, accompanied by the right to express and extend them, is an integral part of the ethical life of each individual and, at the same time, constitutes a fundamental moment in the construction of a responsible civilized community. In this dissertation, I aim to analyse the connection between ethical life and human rights in order to draw attention to the repercussions that the recognition and misrecognition of liberty produce with regard to man's ethical fulfilment. From this perspective, I intend to highlight the importance of the existence of favourable juridical and institutional conditions to ensure ethical fulfilment. At this level, I will underline that the deprivation of capabilities is often the main cause of the profound sense of discontent affecting individuals in their desperate attempt to realise a type of existence which corresponds to their ambitions.


Author(s):  
Hans Morten Haugen

Abstract Norway’s policies regarding Sámi and most national minorities in an historic perspective can be characterized as forced assimilation; except for Jews and Roma, where the historic policy can be termed exclusion. The Norwegian Truth and Reconciliation Commission (trc) is intended to be a broad-based process, resulting in a report to the Norwegian Parliament in 2022. After identifying various explanations for the relatively strong standing of the (North) Sámi domestically and in international forums, the article identifies various ways that human rights will be important for the trc’s work and final report: (i) self-determination; (ii) participation in political life; (iii) participation in cultural life; (iv) family life; (v) private life; and (vi) human dignity. Some of these rights are relatively wide, but all give relevant guidance to the trc’s work. The right to private life did not prevent the Norwegian Parliament’s temporary law to enable the trc’s access to archives


2012 ◽  
Vol 71 (2) ◽  
pp. 325-354 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jill Marshall

AbstractAlthough rare, giving birth in secret or in concealed circumstances still happens in the United Kingdom. The new born child's existence is unknown to his or her biological ‘father’ and or to the wider biological family of the birth giver who wishes to place the child for adoption without his or her existence being revealed to them. Legal decisions need to be made judicially when a local authority seeks orders as to whether it is required to make further inquiries to identify and notify the biological father and or wider biological family as to any forthcoming adoption proceedings. Developments in European human rights law's protection of a right to respect one's private life provided by Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) towards a right to personal autonomy, identity and integrity can be interpreted in different ways. However, three positions are argued here to guard against an erosion of women's confidentiality and privacy in these circumstances. First, women's choices of concealment should be accepted with respect rather than perceived as inauthentic and therefore impermissible; this is in keeping with Article 2's right to life and Article 8's right to personal autonomy and integrity. Second, the right to family life protected by Article 8 of any wider biological family and father is not contravened by allowing women to give birth discreetly. Third, openness and transparency, when it comes to exact knowledge of one's parents in this context is not necessary for a child's identity rights, which are also protected by Article 8's right to personal identity, to be legally protected.


2021 ◽  
Vol 66 ◽  
pp. 240-243
Author(s):  
P. Badzeliuk

This article is devoted to the study of the implementation of the fundamental right of a person to professional legal assistance through the vectors of influence of the bar, the role of the human rights institution in the mechanism of such a right and its place in public life.An effective justice system provides not only an independent and impartial judiciary, but also an independent legal profession. Lawyers play an important role in ensuring access to justice. They facilitate the interaction between individuals and legal entities and the judiciary by providing legal advice to their clients and presenting them to the courts. Without the assistance of a lawyer, the right to a fair trial and the right to an effective remedy would be irrevocably violated.Thus, the bar in the mechanism of protection of human and civil rights and freedoms is one of the means of self-limitation of state power through the creation and active functioning of an independent human rights institution, which is an active subject in the process of fundamental rights. The main constitutional function of the state is to implement and protect the rights and freedoms of man and citizen, and the constitutional and legal status of the legal profession allows it to actively ensure the rights of civil society as a whole and not just the individual. Effectively implement the human rights function of the state by ensuring proper interaction between the authorities and civil society, while being an active participant in the law enforcement mechanism and occupying an independent place in the justice system.Thus, the activities of lawyers are a complex manifestation of both state and public interest. After all, it is through advocacy and thanks to it that the rule of law realizes the possibility of ensuring the rights and freedoms of its citizens. Advocacy, on the one hand, has a constitutionally defined state character, and on the other hand, lawyers should be as independent as possible from the state in order to effectively protect citizens and legal entities from administrative arbitrariness. Thus, the bar is a unique legal phenomenon that performs a state (public-law) function, while remaining an independent, non-governmental self-governing institution.


2021 ◽  
Vol 30 (4) ◽  
pp. 122-154

In the adopted at the 127th plenary session Opinion Venice Commission analyzed the objectives and rationale for the legislative amendments to the laws affecting “foreign agents”; expanding the range of individuals and legal entities that can be designated as “foreign agents”; expansion of administrative requirements and restrictions for “foreign agents”; expansion of sanctions for violation of these requirements and restrictions. The Commission concluded that the adoption of these amendments constitutes a serious violation of fundamental human rights, including freedom of association and expression, the right to privacy, the right to participate in public affairs, and the principle of non-discrimination and expressed especial concern about the cumulative impact of the latest amendments on organizations, individuals, the media and civil society in general.


2021 ◽  
pp. 142-151
Author(s):  
Iulia Butnaru ◽  

Privacy often conflict with other rights and legitimate interests, at which is the question of establishing its boundaries. Obviously there are no clear limits beyond which an infringement must be regarded as permissible. Private life is a concept with an extensive interpretation, which includes different spheres of the person’s life, as demonstrated by the jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights. What is certain is that each person has their own opinion about the extent of privacy and this impression depends on the psychological traits of the person concerned, but also on the traditions and customs that exist in a society at a certain historical stage. The utility of the case law of the European Court of Human Rights in the protection of private life and the family is that it provides precise criteria to be applied by judges to determine whether the complaint submitted under Article 8 of the Convention European Human Rights is one valid.


Author(s):  
Tobin John ◽  
Barrett Damon

This chapter reviews the scope and meaning of the right to health under international law. Drawing on public health discourses and expanding beyond a right to health care, the contours of the right to health have been clarified—to encompass a wide range of social, political, and economic determinants of health—by the United Nations Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (CESCR) in its General Comment 14, by academics in the fields of law and public health, and by national governments in their domestic laws and judicial interpretations. The normative content of the right to health now provides a foundation for state obligations to respect, protect, and fulfill the right to health; limitations on other rights for public health goals; the right’s essential attributes of availability, accessibility, acceptability, and quality; the minimum core obligations of the right to health; and the progressive realization of health-related human rights.


Author(s):  
Joseph J. Amon ◽  
Eric Friedman

This chapter presents an overview of health and human rights advocacy and describes a broad framework and the diverse strategies used by human rights advocates to advance their goals. Based upon documenting abuses, raising awareness, building coalitions, and engaging communities, human rights advocacy seeks to ensure that government laws, policies, and practices respect, protect, and fulfill the right to health of all. These rights arguments and advocacy strategies, first developed in response to the HIV epidemic, have become the basis for broader right to health campaigns. Health-related human rights advocacy, beyond specific strategies, seeks to elevate the voices of people affected by human rights violations, analyze structural barriers, and identify obligations and responsibilities. Focusing on the strategies and tools that human rights advocates use in documenting rights abuses, raising awareness, and seeking change, it is necessary to examine new advocacy partnerships and approaches for evaluating advocacy efforts.


Author(s):  
John Tobin ◽  
Damon Barrett

This chapter reviews the scope and meaning of the right to health under international law. Drawing on public health discourses and expanding beyond a right to health care, the contours of the right to health have been clarified—to encompass a wide range of social, political, and economic determinants of health—by the United Nations Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (CESCR) in its General Comment 14, by academics in the fields of law and public health, and by national governments in their domestic laws and judicial interpretations. The normative content of the right to health now provides a foundation for state obligations to respect, protect, and fulfill the right to health; limitations on other rights for public health goals; the right’s essential attributes of availability, accessibility, acceptability, and quality; the minimum core obligations of the right to health; and the progressive realization of health-related human rights.


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