Alicia Ely Yamin ^1*

¹ Harvard School of Public Health

^* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: ayamin{at}hsph.harvard.edu.

	Abstract

In recent years, there have been considerable developments in international law with respect to the normative definition of the right to health, which includes both health care and healthy conditions. These norms offer a framework that shifts the analysis of issues such as disparities in treatment from questions of quality to matters of social justice. Building on work in social epidemiology, a rights paradigm explicitly links health with laws, policies, and practices that sustain a functional democracy and focuses on accountability. In the United States, framing a well-documented problem such as health disparities as a "rights violation" attaches shame and blame to governmental neglect. Further, international law offer standards for evaluating governmental conduct as well as mechanisms for establishing some degree of accountability.

Key Words: Health Policy, Human Rights, Race/Ethnicity