Health and the Environment: A Human Rights Agenda for the Future

Linkages between health and the environment are increasingly recognized, but human rights law still does not provide an adequate framework for dealing with those connections. Environmental health issues now are seen as involving many institutions, processes, actors, and causes that are not immediately obvious. This reality requires changes in the human rights agenda. Practitioners should not take an overly legalistic and norm-based approach to health and the environment. While the right to a healthy environment is a useful concept, it is more effective to focus on how to implement the right to health from a policy perspective. Practitioners need to think about how human rights approaches can pressure decision-makers and social institutions to consider the environmental causes of ill health. Finally, it is hoped that human rights and environmental movements will work together more effectively in the future.