CCPR/C/116/D/2324/2013 constitute discrimination unless they are supported by reasonable and objective criteria and i a legitimate purpose . 10. This Committee has long recognized that the enjoyment of rights and freedoms on an equal footing does not mean identical treatment of men and women in every instance and may require differential treatment in order to overcome conditions that cause or help to j perpetuate discrimination . The Committee accordingly has recognized that interference with women’s access to reproductive health services can violate their rights to equality and k non-discrimination . Protection of sex and gender equality obligates States parties to respect women’s privacy in relation to their reproductive functions, including prohibiting States from imposing restrictions on women’s access to sterilization and from requiring health personnel to report women who have undergone abortion. It also prohibits employers l from requesting pregnancy tests before hiring women . Gender equality requires that pregnant women in State custody receive appropriate care, obligates States to afford access to safe abortion services to women who have become pregnant as a result of rape, and obligates them to ensure that women are able to access information necessary for equal m enjoyment of their rights . 11. This approach comports with that of the CEDAW Committee, which has emphasized that a State’s failure or refusal to provide reproductive health services that only n women need constitutes gender discrimination . Even facially identical treatment of men o and women may discriminate if it fails to take into account women’s different needs . 12. Women’s unique reproductive biology traditionally has been one of the primary grounds for de jure and de facto discrimination against women. This is true when women are treated differently from men based on stereotyped assumptions about their biology and social roles, such as the claim that women are less able to take full time or demanding jobs p than men. It is equally true when apparently gender-neutral laws disproportionately or exclusively burden women because they fail to take into account the unique circumstances of women. Both types of laws subject women to discrimination. i j k l m n o p 22 pregnancy and such a refusal therefore constitutes direct discrimination on grounds of sex”); Brooks v. Canada Safeway Ltd., [1989] 1 S.C.R. 1219 (“Discrimination on the basis of pregnancy is discrimination on the basis of sex.”). General Comment No. 18, para. 13. General Comment No. 18, paras. 8, 10. General Comment No. 28, paras. 10, 11, 20. Id., para. 20. Id., paras. 11, 15, 22. CEDAW Committee, General Recommendation No. 24, Article 12: Women and health (1999), paras. 11-12. The CEDAW Committee has recognized that it is discriminatory for a State party to refuse to legally provide for the performance of certain reproductive health services for women, and that health care policies must addresses distinctive factors which differ for women in comparison to men, including biological factors and psychosocial factors such as post-partum depression. Ibid. See also CEDAW Communication No. 22/2009, L.C. v. Peru (Views adopted 17 Oct. 2011), para. 8.15 (State’s failure to provide a minor rape victim with a therapeutic abortion denied her “access to medical services that her physical and mental condition required”, in violation of her rights to nondiscrimination and equal access to health care). CEDAW Committee, General Recommendation No. 28 on the core obligations of States parties under article 2 (2010), para. 5 (“[I]dentical or neutral treatment of women and men might constitute discrimination against women if such treatment resulted in or had the effect of women being denied the exercise of a right because there was no recognition of the pre-existing gender-based disadvantage and inequality that women face.”). CESCR, General Comment No. 20, supra, para. 20. Cf. Muller v. Oregon, 208 U.S. 412 (1908) (upholding restrictions on working hours of women based on gender stereotypes).