Sexual health human rights and the law

8 | Sexual health, human rights and the law
The eight topics identified were:
i. Non-discrimination, including (non)
discrimination based on sex, including issues
related to: sexual harassment; age (special
attention to adolescents); sexual orientation;
gender identity and expression; marital status;
health and other relevant status such as being
a migrant or a prisoner.
ii. Penalization of sexuality/sexual activities,
including: the (de)criminalization of samesex
sexual activity; (de)criminalization of
(intentional) transmission of HIV; age of consent/
statutory rape; and sexual activity in prisons and
other state custodial institutions.
iii. State regulation of marriage and family,
including: the (de)criminalization of sex outside
marriage; consent to marriage; conditions
placed on permission to marry, such as virginity
testing and testing for HIV/STIs.
iv. Gender identity/expression, including: civil
status registration; (de)criminalization of certain
aspects of gender expression; access to health
services; (non)discrimination and protection
from violence.
v. Violence, including domestic/intimate partner
violence; sexual violence (including rape
and in different contexts such as marriage or
incarceration); female genital mutilation; police
brutality/failure to respond due to sexuality or
gender-related appearance/behaviour; hate
crimes; honour crimes; and sexual exploitation,
including trafficking of minors.
vi. Availability, accessibility, acceptability
and quality of sexual health services,
including: services for abortion, contraception,
STI prevention, testing and treatment, and
other relevant health services; and access to
appropriate services for specific populations
such as prisoners, refugees, injecting drug
users, adolescents, the military, physically
and mentally disabled people, trafficked people,
and older people.
vii. Information, education and expression
related to sexuality and sexual health,
including: sexuality education; sexuality and
sexual health information; erotic expression;
and (de)criminalization of obscenity/
indecency.
viii. Sex work, including: (de)criminalization;
legalization/regulation; and (non)
discrimination in access to health care
and other services.
2.3 Search strategy and data sources
2.3.1 Human rights, legal and jurisprudential data
Three levels of document sources were culled and
reviewed: international, regional and national.
Regions were defined according to the WHO regions:
African Region, Region of the Americas, Eastern
Mediterranean Region, European Region, South-East
Asian Region and the Western Pacific Region.
For each region, the researchers from each region
made an in-depth review of both the regional
human rights law and the laws and jurisprudence
of selected countries, culling examples of national
laws and highest court decisions according to the
inclusion/exclusion criteria listed below. Based on
grey literature and interviews with experts, they
identified relevant national laws, which they then
located and, where necessary, translated.
Sources of information
(a) International sources: United Nations
(UN) human rights treaties; international
humanitarian law (primarily the Geneva
Conventions and their protocols); international
criminal law (primarily the International
Criminal Court’s Rome Statute [14], definitions
of crimes, ad hoc and hybrid tribunal statutes
and case law, and the UN Protocol to Prevent,
Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons
[Palermo Protocol; 15]); refugee law (primarily
the 1951 Convention relating to the Status
of Refugees and its 1967 Protocol, and the
authoritative Handbook and guidelines on
procedures and criteria for determining refugee
status [16]); international labour law (primarily