Anjali Sharma
GG News Bureau
UNITED NATIONS, 23rd June. UN rights expert on Thursday told the Human Rights Council that the right to keep personal health data private is increasingly under threat in our digital world, with potentially devastating consequences for already vulnerable people.
Special Rapporteur on the right to health, Tlaleng Mofokeng, warned that technology enabled easy sharing of sensitive health data of adolescents, migrants and people whose sexual orientation or health status was subject to discrimination.
“Accessibility of information through digital tools should not impair the right to have personal health data treated with confidentiality,” Ms. Mofokeng insisted.
Ms. Mofokeng highlighted the dangerous use by State and non-State actors of mobile communication, geo-mapping and search history data against people seeking contraception or abortions in jurisdictions – such as some states in the US – which criminalize these health services, resulting in prosecution, arrest and further stigma.
She pointed out that while technology can enable broader access to healthcare through solutions such as telemedicine, the global digital divide results in major inequalities in this area between countries, genders and social and age groups.
They noted that the disastrous effects of poverty and socio-economic inequality on female health were among the glaring injustices highlighted by the Working Group on discrimination against women and girls.
Dorothy Estrada-Tanck, group chair presented a report to the Council showed that globally, women and girls are disproportionately represented among those living in poverty.
She stressed that they often face stigma and criminalization when seeking reproductive healthcare and services, including abortion.
“When women and girls cannot access sexual and reproductive health education, information, goods and services, family planning services, gender-based inequalities and poverty are further entrenched and may be transmitted to future generations,” Ms. Estrada-Tanck warned.
They said that discrimination against lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans and gender-diverse persons that LGBT rights were not incompatible with freedom of religion as some Member States insisted.
Victor Madrigal-Borloz, the expert on protection against violence and discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity, said that LGBT persons are often marginalized, stigmatized and excluded from religious communities “simply because of who they are”.
He warned against the use of religious narratives to justify denying LGBT persons their human rights and said that embracing spirituality and faith is a path that must be available to all, including those with diverse sexual orientations and gender identities.
Council will address the world’s most pressing human rights emergencies.
Member States have discussed the situation in Afghanistan, Eritrea, Iran, Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Myanmar, Nicaragua, Sri Lanka and Sudan.
The highlights will include a review of the impact of climate change on human rights, as well as a focus on Belarus, Burundi, Central African Republic, Syria, Ukraine and Venezuela.
Council will take action on a number of resolutions resulted from these discussions, put forward by its 47 Member States before closing its session on 14 July.
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