Sexual rights
Definition
Sexual rights are a subset of human rights that implicate gender and sexuality. Sexual rights include protections against violence and discrimination in sexual situations and based on sexual orientation, as well as access to reproductive health information, preventive care, and treatment. Violations to sexual rights can be direct, such as through sexual assault and harassment, or indirect, like in the form of anti-LGBTQIA+ laws that enable stigma and discrimination. Both the experience and anticipation of these abuses can lead to mental illness, physical disability, incarceration, and social ostracisation, among other effects. These effects derived from the violation of sexual rights can be uniquely traumatising and consequential.
Sexual rights are fundamental to asserting and maintaining reproductive health. Respectively, these can influence risks of HIV exposure, willingness to undergo HIV testing, and ability to seek out and adhere to quality HIV treatment. Unless and until people can be assured their sexual rights are protected, HIV programs and policies may be unable to fully support them.
Precedents
2021 Global AIDS Strategy 2021-2026
“Repeal discriminatory laws and policies that increase women and girls’ vulnerability to HIV and address violations of their sexual and reproductive health and rights.” (paragraph 153(h))
2021 Political declaration on HIV and AIDS
“Recognize that sexual and gender-based violence, including intimate partner violence, the unequal socioeconomic status of women, structural barriers to women’s economic empowerment and insufficient protection of the sexual and reproductive health and reproductive rights, in accordance with the Programme of Action of the International Conference on Population and Development, the 1995 Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action and the outcome documents of their review conferences, of women and girls compromise their ability to protect themselves from HIV infection and aggravate the impact of AIDS.” (paragraph 29)
“Increasing national leadership, resource allocation and other evidence - based enabling measures for proven HIV combination prevention, including condom promotion and distribution, pre-exposure prophylaxis, post-exposure prophylaxis, voluntary male medical circumcision, harm reduction, in accordance with national legislation, sexual and reproductive health-care services, including screening and treatment of sexually transmitted infections, enabling legal and policy environments, full access to comprehensive information and education, in and out of school.” (paragraph 30(a))
“Reaffirm the commitment to sexual and reproductive health and reproductive rights, in accordance with the Programme of Action of the International Conference on Population and Development, the 1995 Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action and the outcome documents of their review conferences, and reaffirm the right of every human being to the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health, including sexual and reproductive health.” (paragraph 9)
2006 Political Declaration on HIV/AIDS
“Pledge to eliminate gender inequalities, gender-based abuse and violence; increase the capacity of women and adolescent girls to protect themselves from the risk of HIV infection, principally through the provision of health care and services, including, inter alia, sexual and reproductive health, and the provision of full access to comprehensive information and education; ensure that women can exercise their right to have control over, and decide freely and responsibly on, matters related to their sexuality in order to increase their ability to protect themselves from HIV infection, including their sexual and reproductive health, free of coercion, discrimination and violence; and take all necessary measures to create an enabling environment for the empowerment of women and strengthen their economic independence; and in this context, reiterate the importance of the role of men and boys in achieving gender equality.” (paragraph 30)
2001 Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS
“By 2005, bearing in mind the context and character of the epidemic and that, globally, women and girls are disproportionately affected by HIV/AIDS, develop and accelerate the implementation of national strategies that promote the advancement of women and women’s full enjoyment of all human rights; promote shared responsibility of men and women to ensure safe sex; and empower women to have control over and decide freely and responsibly on matters related to their sexuality to increase their ability to protect themselves from HIV infection.” (paragraph 59)
Expert precedents
2022 Report of the Independent Expert on SOGI: Practices of Exclusion
“Women are targets of discrimination and violence around the world, and the recognition of their sexual and reproductive rights–that is, their ability to take decisions in relation to their bodies and sexuality–is a prerequisite for ensuring their full enjoyment of rights.” (paragraph 20)
Evidence
2022 WHO Consolidated Guidelines on HIV, Viral Hepatitis and STI Prevention, Diagnosis, Treatment and Care for Key Populations
“A modelling study estimated that reduced sexual violence against sex workers could reduce new HIV infections by 25% among sex workers and their clients. Women, especially young women from key populations, including women who use drugs, female sex workers, people in prisons and transgender women, experience particularly high rates of physical, sexual and psychological abuse.” (p. 23)
2021 State of World Population
“Widow inheritance, for example, requires a woman to engage in sexual relations with the man who “inherits” her, regardless of how many sexual partners he may have had in the past, increasing the risk of HIV transmission.” (p. 38)
2021 WHO Consolidated Guidelines on HIV Prevention, Testing, Treatment, Service Delivery and Monitoring
“A package of interventions including screening, treatment and/or prophylaxis for major opportunistic infections, rapid ART initiation and intensified adherence support interventions should be offered to everyone presenting with advanced HIV disease (strong recommendation, moderate-certainty evidence).” (p.xxv)
2016 Prevention Gap Report
“A modelling study estimated that eliminating sexual violence against sex workers could avert 17% of HIV infections in Kenya and 20% in Canada.” (p. 27)