A Human Right to What Kind of Health?

Abstract

ABSTRACT Until now, it has mostly been assumed that the kind of health the human right to health is concerned with is clearly understood and universal. Here, I question this assumption and offer an explicitly political and pluralistic account of health that is designed to help guide international and cross-cultural interventions on behalf of health. In order to be a useful mechanism of accountability, the human right to health needs an enforceable minimum standard of health by which to judge situations and to determine if a violation of rights has occurred, but due to its international nature, it also needs to admit a large degree of cultural flexibility. With the account of health that I provide, I hope to clarify what makes up that minimum standard in a way that avoids unjustified parochial bias, while not being so permissive as to undermine the political force of a universal human right.