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<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"Georgia","serif"">Dear all,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"Georgia","serif""><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family:"Georgia","serif"">thanks to all the persons and organisations that have worked on the preparation of Right to Health position paper and the tool kit for monitoring the adherence to RTH approach in
national health policies.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family:"Georgia","serif""><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family:"Georgia","serif"">I would like to bring up the issue of learning from the experiences of others in continuing our work on RTH. I am referring to the work done by organisations of persons with disabilities
for their human rights.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family:"Georgia","serif""><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family:"Georgia","serif"">In December 2006 the United Nations approved the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) along with an optional protocol. It came into force on 8 May 2008. According
to latest information, CRPD has been signed by 153 countries and has been ratified by national parliaments of 112 countries. How did they manage to do so much in such a short time?<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family:"Georgia","serif""><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family:"Georgia","serif"">CRPD is accompanied by a UN monitoring mechanism so that each signatory country is required to (1) update national laws to ensure the compliance with articles of CRPD (2) present
a periodic report of national implementation to the UN monitoring body. Organisations of persons with disabilities (DPOs) in different countries are taking an active role in raising up issues of violations of human rights and are also going to courts to hold
their governments to account.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family:"Georgia","serif""><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family:"Georgia","serif"">If you ask persons with disabilities in the communities, most of them would not know what is CRPD. But if you ask this question to their national DPOs, it will be difficult to find
an organisation in any country where persons do not know about CRPD and have not participated in some kind of capacity building about implementation and monitoring of their Convention. CRPD is available in easy to understand format for children and other persons
who are not familiar with international conventions.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family:"Georgia","serif""><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family:"Georgia","serif"">Compared to CRPD and the success of DPOs, our own efforts for promoting RTH seem to be lagging far behind and more of an uphill struggle. Some of the reasons for this are clear. We
don’t have our national representative organisations and federations that can speak with one voice, ask for the Governments to listen to them and speak at international level. We do not have a body like International Disability Alliance (IDA) that brings together
international networks and federations of national DPOs, professionals, international NGOs, UN organisations, etc. that can speak for us in one voice.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family:"Georgia","serif""><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family:"Georgia","serif"">However, perhaps we can learn from them about how they did it, how they are doing it?<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family:"Georgia","serif""><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family:"Georgia","serif"">With best wishes,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family:"Georgia","serif""><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family:"Georgia","serif"">Sunil<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family:"Georgia","serif""><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family:"Georgia","serif"">Dr Sunil Deepak<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family:"Georgia","serif"">AIFO and PHM Italy<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB" style="color:#1F497D">>>>>>>>>>>>>>></span><span lang="EN-GB"><br>
The RTH position paper is now online!!<br>
<br>
</span><a href="http://www.phmovement.org/en/campaigns/145/page" target="_blank">http://www.phmovement.org/en/campaigns/145/page</a><br>
<br>
Anneleen De Keukelaere<br>
Global Networking Co-ordinator People's Health Movement<o:p></o:p></p>
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