b. If the NHRI offers health insurance
or other kinds of support for health
care, the NHRI should ensure that
this includes access to the full range
of reproductive health services,
including family planning and contraception. This is for example the case
for the NHRIs in Uganda and Jordan.
c. The NHRI should have a policy in
place with respect to sexually transmitted infections, in particular HIV/
AIDS, based on human rights principles and including access to prevention, such as male and female
condoms.
d. The NHRI should have other relevant
policies and guidelines in place, such
as a policy regarding sexual harassment and a policy on non-discrimination, including on the basis of sex,
age, disability, sexual orientation,
marital status, or any other status.
LEGISLATIVE AND ADMINISTRATIVE PROVISIONS
NHRIs can use this part of the mandate in
several ways:
1. NHRIs could conduct a review of legislative and administrative regulations
specifically focusing on reproductive
rights. When considering such regulations, the benchmark should be both
the relevant international human rights
obligations and the national provisions
as set out in, for example, the constitution. The focus could be on areas of
legislation that would seem particularly
relevant for the enjoyment of reproductive rights:
a. One such area is family law where
the NHRI could for instance look at
provisions on marriage age and on
equality; as set out in the next chapter, the marriage age should be identical for men and woman, and family
law regulations should be devoid of
provisions reinforcing the still common view of women as less valuable
than men.
38
b. Another area is laws on access to
quality health services; such laws
and regulations should establish
clear, objective and measurable standards of access, quality and cultural
acceptability of healthcare services
and cement the right to reproductive health services while respecting
various tenets of human rights, such
as the right to consent, the right to
privacy even for adolescents etc.
Standard setting is fundamental to
strengthen the regulatory role of the
state in cases where basic sexual
and reproductive health services are
privatized. It is important to ensure
that the legislation contains sufficient safeguards so that privatization
does not hamper, in any way, access
to quality reproductive and sexual
health services in particular by vulnerable and marginalized groups.4
4 This is among the issues raised at the UNFPAAsia Pacific Forum consultation 20-21 June 2011 in
Kuala Lumpur, cf. the report of this meeting, p. 6.
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