Policy Paper - A Role for International Law in Containing COVID-19:

An agreement to recognize the essential role of international cooperation and to comply with the commitment to take joint and separate action to achieve the full realization of the right to health is invoked in the UN Charter28, the ICESCR29, and the Alma-Ata Declaration30. [...] What are the obligations arising from the right to health? According to the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNCHR) and the WHO, the right to health leads to three immediate obligations. [...] Violation of Obligations In determining violation of immediate obligations arising from the right to health, first of all, it is necessary to distinguish the inability of a State from unwillingness to comply with its obligations, in order to fully realize the highest attainable standard of health under Article 12 of the ICESCR, and an obligation to take the necessary steps to the maximum of its av. [...] For the adjudication of individual and group complaints against a State party to the ICESCR, a working group of the UN Commission on Human Rights was convened in 200461 to debate the feasibility of elaborating an Optional Protocol to the ICESCR62 that would provide for the adjudication of individual and group complaints against the State parties under the ICESCR63. [...] In addition, the less strict observance of obligations emanating from the right to life seems to justify the opening of negotiations on more effectively ensuring the full realization of the right to health in the form of a legally-binding new pandemic treaty.