Towards a universal definition of the right to health?

Despite the fact that the right to health is solidly embedded in various international human rights documents, there remains widespread confusion about the precise meaning of this right and its legal ramifications. It is widely believed that the absence of a universal definition, together with the lack of clarity about the nature and scope of corresponding State obligations, impede States from realising the aspirations enshrined in the right to health. In fact, conceptual unclearness is also likely to discourage national judges and treaty monitoring bodies from critically measuring--and if necessary, enforcing--State compliance and to deter Non-Governmental Organizations (NGO'S) from using the existing national and international system to monitor compliance, to report violations and to engage in other activities typically performed by human rights advocacy groups. This article seeks to articulate the meaning of the right to health, by focusing on its core content and the obligations thought to be inherent to this right. Attention will also be paid to the need to design accurate human rights indicators to document and analyse trends. A call is made for the adoption of a special General Comment on the right to health, not only to enable States Parties to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights to better pursue their obligations, but equally to incite more academic discussion, to draw the interest of human rights NGO'S and, last but not least, to do justice to a right which is intimately related to human dignity, the concept underlying all human rights.