A/HRC/33/24
inequalities. Further efforts are needed to establish methodologies that effectively capture
multiple and intersecting forms of discrimination and inequality.
62.
Reducing preventable maternal mortality and morbidity from a human rights
perspective also requires accountability when rights have been violated and access to an
effective gender-sensitive remedy. Target 16.3 on rule of law and equal access to justice
speaks to an important aspect of accountability, which is often neglected in interventions
focused only on the health dimensions of maternal mortality.
F.
Human rights indicators
63.
The importance of identifying appropriate indicators has been mentioned throughout
the present section. However, because the indicator framework will play a major role in
determining how the targets and goals get interpreted, additional attention must be paid to
this important issue. The submission made by the Statistical Commission
(E/CN.3/2016/2/Rev.1) represents a commendable effort to embrace the ambitious vision of
the 2030 Agenda, including with respect to human rights. Combined with the indicators that
have been proposed under the Global Strategy,12 there is a strong basis for measuring State
effort and results in reducing maternal mortality and morbidity in accordance with human
rights obligations.
64.
However, even if adopted in their entirety, those globally identified indicators will
not suffice to provide an understanding of whether women and girls are truly enjoying their
human rights, especially their sexual and reproductive health rights. Assessing the
enjoyment of human rights cannot be reduced to collection of data, no matter how robust
the information gathered. Human rights monitoring and documentation methodologies,
which include qualitative indicators and context-specific analysis, are critical
complementary tools to indicator selection and measurement to enable a fuller
understanding of whether States are meeting their human rights obligations. In that regard,
it is crucial that analysis of progress on Sustainable Development Goals indicators is
considered together with wider human rights reporting, for example, to United Nations
treaty bodies and the universal periodic review or through national processes led by
national human rights institutions.
65.
The Sustainable Development Goals indicator framework should be anchored in
human rights standards. The recently adopted general comment No. 22 of the Committee on
Economic, Social and Cultural Rights provides an important foundation for understanding
the breadth of the issues to be covered. In the annex to the present report, a table is
presented laying out proposed indicators with cross-references to the core content of the
right to sexual and reproductive health. Some additional indicators, which could be read
into existing proposed Sustainable Development Goals and Global Strategy indicators, or
could be integrated in national adaptation processes, could include:
(a)
Existence of discriminatory laws that criminalize or place other barriers to an
individual’s access to sexual and reproductive health services, goods and information;
(b)
Percentage of health-care facilities in a country that offer a minimum package
of sexual and reproductive health services;
(c)
Indicators to assess the availability and quality of basic and comprehensive
emergency obstetric care;
12
Every Woman Every Child, “Indicator and monitoring framework for the Global Strategy for
Women’s, Children’s and Adolescents’ Health” (2016).
15
Select target paragraph3
Connect to a paragraph
Connect to an entity
Disable highlights
Add to table of contents