ABSTRACT
Human rights principles have not played a prominent role in discussions of health in the USA. Human rights discussions in the context of medicine or public health have usually been limited to patients’ rights and notions of informed consent. Little attention has been paid to broader human rights obligations that are critical to ensuring fundamental human rights to health, such as rights to information or nondiscrimination based on gender or sexual orientation. In this chapter, we will examine US Federal government promotion of abstinence using a human rights perspective that builds on international documents such as the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. A critical focus here is on the ‘right to information’ – as articulated in multiple of these international accords. This chapter focuses in particular on the rights issues raised by US government promotion of ‘abstinence until marriage’ or ‘abstinence only’. First, we examine public health critiques of abstinence-only policies and programmes, as these perspectives are important in grounding a human rights analysis in public health realities. Then we review the human rights of adolescents and young people as related to health and government responsibilities to promote the information needed to protect young people’s lives and health. We conclude that recent US government efforts to promote abstinence-only education are inconsistent with the internationally accepted right to health information. Based on this analysis, we suggest that US government policy should embrace a vision for sexuality education grounded in access to complete and accurate sexual health information, articulated as a basic human right and recognised as essential to realising the human right to the highest attainable standard of health.
