Equality and Non-Discrimination

The worldwide spread of COVID-19 has highlighted the relationship between global health law and human rights. However, a recent court case in Kenya reveals the intrinsic link between inequalities and economic concerns capable of limiting national and international rights standards.

Mandatory vaccination interferes with personal integrity but may be necessary to safeguard public health. However, states must consider all relevant factors in context and ensure such policies do not place disproportionate burdens on those hesitant about vaccination.

Intersectional discrimination against people on the move underpins inadequate responses to COVID-19. The right to enjoy the benefits of scientific progress and its applications clearly demands substantive racial equality when designing economic and public health measures to address the pandemic.

Emergencies pose particular challenges to ethical research – yet research is essential for effective emergency response. Complementing human rights approaches, an ‘ethical compass’ of core values provides a basis to allocate responsibilities to a wide range of non-state duty-bearers.

The African Commission has emerged as a key voice promoting a continent-wide human rights response to COVID-19, while urging a shift in focus to tackle the massive underlying structural inequalities starkly exposed by the pandemic.

A global pandemic such as the one we are experiencing is one of those disruptive events that can generate momentum to revisit some of our basic assumptions and to delineate creative ways to shape the future(s).

When the UN founding members promoted the entry into force of the Constitution of the World Health Organization in 1948 they declared inequality in the promotion of health and control of communicable diseases a common threat.

#BuildBackBetter is one of the hashtags from the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic.
It speaks to hope, and to history too.