PHM-Exch> Call by UN Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women for Submissions

[Claudio Schuftan]

From: Sarojini N. <sarojinipr at gmail.com>
CALL BY UN SPECIAL RAPPORTEUR ON VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN FOR SUBMISSIONS:
MISTREATMENT & VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN DURING REPRODUCTIVE CARE, WITH A
FOCUS ON CHILDBIRTH

The mandate of the United Nations Special Rapporteur on violence against
women, its causes and consequences was established in 1994 by the (then)
Commission on Human Rights and requests the Special Rapporteur to “*recommend
measures, ways and means at the local, national, regional and international
levels to eliminate all forms of violence against women and its causes, and
to remedy its consequences*.”

Pursuant to this mandate, the Special Rapporteur, Ms. Dubravka Šimonović
has identified the issue of mistreatment and violence against women during
reproductive health care and childbirth as the subject of her next thematic
report to be presented at the 74th session of the General Assembly in
September 2019.

Mistreatment and violence against women during reproductive health care and
facility-based child birth is a serious violation of women’s human rights
which occurs across all geographical and income-level settings1. In a
statement published in 2014, the World Health Organization reported that
disrespectful and abusive treatment occurs during childbirth in facilities
and includes “*outright physical abuse, profound humiliation and verbal
abuse, coercive or unconsented medical procedures (including
sterilization), lack of confidentiality, failure to get fully informed
consent, refusal to give pain medication, gross violations of privacy,
refusal of admission to health facilities, neglecting women during
childbirth to suffer life-threatening, avoidable complications, and
detention of women and their newborns in facilities after childbirth due to
an inability to pay*.”2

International human rights bodies and experts have addressed some of the
types of mistreatment and violence, however, they have focused on a limited
number of issues and their analysis of those issues has largely failed to
take into account the broader context in which mistreatment and violence
occur.  In her forthcoming report, the Special Rapporteur aims to build on
the existing standards to offer a more holistic presentation of the
mistreatment and violence that women experience when accessing reproductive
health services and particularly during facility-based childbirth, as well
as its causes, and provide recommendations for States on how to address
these issues.  As such, the report seeks to lay the foundation for States
to develop appropriate policies and strategies to ensure human rights-based
approach to health care and accountability for human rights obligations and
political commitments. The Special Rapporteur’s report will be the first
human rights report by a special procedure dedicated to the issue of
mistreatment and violence experienced by women in reproductive health care
and facility-based childbirth and placing it in the broader context of a
continuum of sexual and reproductive rights violations.

In this regard, the Special Rapporteur on violence against women wishes to
secure views from States, non-governmental organizations, National Human
Rights Institutions as well as members of academia on the following
questions:

   1. Please indicate whether in your country there are cases of
   mistreatment and violence against women during reproductive health care,
   particularly facility-based childbirth. If so, please specify what kind of
   cases and describe your country’s response and any good practices,
   including protection of human rights;
   2. Please specify if full and informed consent is administered for any
   type of reproductive health care and if these include childbirth care;
   3. Please specify whether there are accountability mechanisms in place
   within the health facilities to ensure redress for victims of mistreatment
   and violence, including filing complaints, financial compensation,
   acknowledgement of wrongdoing and guarantees of non-repetition. Please
   indicate whether the ombudsperson is mandated to address such human rights
   violations;
   4. Does your health systems have policies that guide health responses to
   VAW and are these in line with WHO guidelines and standards on this issue,
   see: 1
   <https://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/259489/9789241513005-eng.pdf;jsessionid=87D2C09FA4E78A6C623ADA9989B2E34E?sequence=1>
    | 2
   <https://www.who.int/reproductivehealth/publications/violence/9789241548595/en/>

All submissions should be sent to vaw at ohchr.org *by 17 May 2019*. You are
kindly requested to provide your submissions in English, French or Spanish,
which are the working languages of the Secretariat.

https://www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Women/SRWomen/Pages/Mistreatment.aspx
------------------------------

Notes

1. Bohren MA et al., The Mistreatment of Women during Childbirth in Health
Facilities Globally: A Mixed-Methods Systematic Review
<https://journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/article?id=10.1371/journal.pmed.1001847>

2. World Health Organization, statement on “prevention and elimination of
disrespect and abuse during childbirth.
<https://www.who.int/reproductivehealth/topics/maternal_perinatal/statement-childbirth/en/>
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