The then-UN Special Rapporteur on the right to health, Paul Hunt, gave this keynote address at the opening plenary of the International Harm Reduction Association’s 2008 conference. Hunt notes that people who use drugs are routinely subjected to numerous human rights violations around the world. He contends that UN drug control bodies and the international human rights system ‘behave as though they exist in parallel universes’. To remedy this, the drug control bodies must address human rights concerns and the human rights system must pay closer attention to issues surrounding drug control. Furthermore, the heart of the right to health is ‘an effective and integrated health system, encompassing health care and the underlying determinants of health’, which includes harm reduction services for people who use drugs.
Citation: Paul Hunt, ‘Human Rights, Health and Harm Reduction: States’ Amnesia and Parallel Universes’, International Harm Reduction Association (2008)