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Global medical ethics
Human rights and the national interest: migrants, healthcare and social justice
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  1. Phillip Cole
  1. Correspondence to:
 Dr P Cole
 Middlesex University, Trent Park, Bramley Road, London N14 4YZ, UK;p.cole{at}mdx.ac.uk

Abstract

The UK government has recently taken steps to exclude certain groups of migrants from free treatment under the National Health Service, most controversially from treatment for HIV. Whether this discrimination can have any coherent ethical basis is questioned in this paper. The exclusion of migrants of any status from any welfare system cannot be ethically justified because the distinction between citizens and migrants cannot be an ethical one.

  • NHS, National Health Service

https://doi.org/10.1136/jme.2005.014829

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    Footnotes

    • ↵i In her report to the United Nations General Assembly, the Special Rapporteur of the Commission on Human Rights Gabriela Rodriguez Pizarro proposed that the following should be considered as migrants: persons who are outside the territory of the State of which they are nationals or citizens, are not subject to its legal protection and are in the territory of another State; persons who do not enjoy the general legal recognition of rights which is inherent in the granting by the host State of the status of refugee, naturalized person or of similar status; persons who do not enjoy general legal protection of their fundamental rights by virtue of diplomatic agreements, visas or other agreements. See “Human rights of migrants”,ref1 p 12. For the role of the Special Rapporteur, see www.ohchr.org/english/issues/migration/rapporteur/

    • ↵ii See “Human rights of migrants”,ref1 p 7. The United Nations Commission on Human Rights resolution 2000/48 affirms that “every State party to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights must undertake to guarantee that the rights enunciated in that Covenant will be exercised without discrimination of any kind, including on the basis of national origin”. See www.unhchr.ch/huridocda/huridoca.nsf/(Symbol)/E.CN.4.RES.2000.48.En?Opendocument

    • ↵iii BBC news/health/’health tourism’ rules unveiled, published 30 December 2003 at http/www.news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/hi/health/3355751stm

    • ↵iv Other organisations have pointed this out too. For the National Aids Trust’s report to the Health Committee, see www.nat.org.uk

    • Competing interests: None.

    • A version of this paper was presented at the Imperial College Department of Primary Care and Social Medicine (DPCSM) Seminar Series in June 2005.

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