TY - JOUR
T1 - Ensuring rights while protecting health
T2 - The hhr_final_logo_alone.indd 1 importance of using a human rights approach in implementing public health responses to covid-19
AU - Zweig, Sophia A.
AU - Zapf, Alexander J.
AU - Beyrer, Chris
AU - Guha-Sapir, Debarati
AU - Haar, Rohini J.
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2021, Harvard School of Public Health. All rights reserved.
PY - 2021/12
Y1 - 2021/12
N2 - In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, governments around the world have implemented public health policies that limit individual freedoms in order to control disease transmission. While such limitations on liberties are sometimes necessary for pandemic control, many of these policies have been overly broad or have neglected to consider the costs for populations already susceptible to human rights violations. Furthermore, the pandemic has exacerbated preexisting inequities based on health care access, poverty, racial injustice, refugee crises, and lack of education. The worsening of such human rights violations increases the need to utilize a human rights approach in the response to COVID-19. This paper provides a global overview of COVID-19 public health policy interventions implemented from January 1 to June 30, 2020, and identifies their impacts on the human rights of marginalized populations. We find that over 70% of these public health policies negatively affect human rights in at least one way or for at least one population. We recommend that policy makers take a human rights approach to COVID-19 pandemic control by designing public health policies focused on the most marginalized groups in society. Doing so would allow for a more equitable, realistic, and sustainable pandemic response that is centered on the needs of those at highest risk of COVID-19 and human rights violations.
AB - In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, governments around the world have implemented public health policies that limit individual freedoms in order to control disease transmission. While such limitations on liberties are sometimes necessary for pandemic control, many of these policies have been overly broad or have neglected to consider the costs for populations already susceptible to human rights violations. Furthermore, the pandemic has exacerbated preexisting inequities based on health care access, poverty, racial injustice, refugee crises, and lack of education. The worsening of such human rights violations increases the need to utilize a human rights approach in the response to COVID-19. This paper provides a global overview of COVID-19 public health policy interventions implemented from January 1 to June 30, 2020, and identifies their impacts on the human rights of marginalized populations. We find that over 70% of these public health policies negatively affect human rights in at least one way or for at least one population. We recommend that policy makers take a human rights approach to COVID-19 pandemic control by designing public health policies focused on the most marginalized groups in society. Doing so would allow for a more equitable, realistic, and sustainable pandemic response that is centered on the needs of those at highest risk of COVID-19 and human rights violations.
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M3 - Article
C2 - 34966234
AN - SCOPUS:85121222893
SN - 1079-0969
VL - 23
SP - 173
EP - 186
JO - Health and human rights
JF - Health and human rights
IS - 2
ER -