A/HRC/39/33 authorization. In addition, particular efforts need to be made to overcome barriers of stigma and fear experienced by, for example, adolescent girls, girls with disabilities and lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex adolescents, in gaining access to such services. Furthermore, the Committee urges States to decriminalize abortion to ensure that girls have access to safe abortion and post-abortion services, review legislation with a view to guaranteeing the best interests of pregnant adolescents and ensure that their views are always heard and respected in abortion-related decisions. Restrictive legal provisions on access to safe and legal abortion also constitute discrimination against girls and young women. 50. Other barriers exist where adolescents are not provided with the information required to understand their sexual and reproductive health needs, which hinders their ability to proactively take measures to prevent unwanted pregnancy or sexually transmitted infections or disease. In this regard, comprehensive sexuality education is particularly important, bearing in mind that adolescent girls and young women 15 to 19 years old account for 11 per cent of all births and around 14 per cent of all maternal deaths, and that 3.9 million unsafe abortions occur globally every year among adolescent girls 15 to 19 years of age. 51. The Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights has indicated that all adolescents should have access to free, confidential, adolescent-responsive and nondiscriminatory sexual and reproductive health services, information and education, available both online and in person, including on family planning, contraception, including emergency contraception, prevention, care and treatment of sexually transmitted infections, counselling, preconception care, maternal health services and menstrual hygiene. The Committee urges States to adopt comprehensive gender and sexuality-sensitive sexual and reproductive health policies for adolescents, emphasizing that unequal access by adolescents to such information, commodities and services amounts to discrimination. 21 52. Moreover, submissions received for the present report indicated that the lack of mental health support services was a challenge for young people, with particularly negative consequences on vulnerable groups, such as transgender, non-binary and intersex youth. 22 Submissions received also pointed to a lack of services for indigenous youth, as well as refugee and migrant youth, in addition to stigma and harassment for young people who use drugs. D. Conscientious objection to military service 53. Conscientious objection to military service concerns young people more than any other group. Indeed, the age at which young men and women are drafted into compulsory military service or receive their call-up papers in many States is around 18 years. 54. The Ibero-American Convention on the Rights of Youth explicitly recognizes the right to conscientious objection as a youth right. Article 12 of the Convention states that youth have the right to conscientious objection against obligatory military service and that States parties undertake to promote the pertinent legal measures to guarantee the exercise of this right and advance in the progressive elimination of obligatory military service. It further states that States parties undertake to assure youth under 18 years of age that they shall not be called up or involved, in any way, in military hostilities. 55. The right to conscientious objection to military service is based on article 18 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which guarantees the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion or belief. While the Covenant does not explicitly refer to a right to conscientious objection, in 1993 the Human Rights Committee stated that such a right could be derived from article 18, inasmuch as the obligation to use lethal force might 21 22 General comment No. 20 (2009) on non-discrimination in economic, social and cultural rights, para. 29. Report on the regional consultation on youth and human rights (see footnote 4). 11