Health, Trade and Human Rights

Health, Trade and Human RightsEdited by Gert P. Westert, Lea Jabaaij and François G. SchellevisRadcliffeOxfordISBN 1 84619 050 9Théodore H. MacDonald, Institute of Human Rights and Social Justice, Metropolitan University of London, London, UK and External Examiner, Postgraduate Department of Medicine, University of Central Lancashire,Preston, UKForewords by Desmond M. Tutu and Mogobe Ramose, respectively Archbishop Emeritus, Cape Town, South Africa; Chairperson and Professor of Philosophy, Department of Philosophy, University of South Africa

Keywords Third World, Health services, Equality, Social welfare

Health, Trade and Human Rights shows how a policy of “free”rather than “fair” trade increasingly undermines Third World health. It clearly illustrates how the looming environmental crisis combined with growing levels of health inequity will have adverse effects and details precisely how the “basic human rights” enshrined in the UN Charter have gradually become subsidiary to the dictates of free trade, enforced by the World Trade Organisation.

This groundbreaking new book argues the need for impartial, data-based, and trans-national arbitration of equity in health and other human rights –and suggests how this might be accomplished without violence to national rights,with an emphasis on “regional free trade”.

Health, Trade and Human Rights provides vital, thought-provoking information for general readers with an interest in the Third World and social welfare. Academics and students studying development, international studies and public health will find it invaluable, as will healthcare professionals,international healthcare organisations, care agencies, and international charities. Policy makers and shapers in communities and government will find the content revelatory, as will political activists and those with an interest in equality and globalisation.

“[The book] criticises the basis, the method and the extent to which the politics of wealth continues to undermine and violate the right of the poor to good health. The combination of experience with scientific rigour is presented in accessible everyday language. It is seductive; inviting the curiosity of the reader to last until the very end of the book. MacDonald’s message is clear and unambiguous: war is no longer the father of all things. Instead, justice is the mother of all peace” (Mogobe Ramose).

“Astonishingly accessible, informing and inspiring. Statistically sound, penetratingly accurate, admirably balanced. Theodore MacDonald writes with passion, as well as with sense. Much of what he has to say is drawn from his own experience working as a medical doctor and a mathematician in a broad range of the world’s poorest nations. But overarching that is a powerful insight into social and economic issues, along with well-honed skills as a communicator. I am pleased to recommend this splendid book” (Desmond M. Tutu).