Voluntary, human rights-based family planning: a conceptual framework

Area of Science:

• Public Health
• Human Rights Law
• Reproductive Health

Background:

• The 2012 Family Planning Summit set a goal to provide services to 120 million additional women and girls by 2020.
• Concerns were raised that this numerical target might overshadow the human rights focus of the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development.

Purpose of the Study:

• To present a novel conceptual framework for achieving the FP2020 goal.
• To unify family planning program strategies with human rights principles and quality-of-care standards.

Main Methods:

• Development of a new unifying conceptual framework.
• Integration of human rights laws and principles into existing family planning and quality-of-care frameworks.

Main Results:

• The proposed framework bridges programmatic and human rights perspectives in family planning.
• It offers a practical approach to address human rights concerns within family planning initiatives.

Conclusions:

• A unified framework is essential for achieving global family planning goals while upholding human rights.
• This approach can guide public health and human rights communities in delivering rights-based family planning services.