A/HRC/39/48 right to life 22 and the right to health, including provisions for “healthy working conditions”.23 19. The Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights clarifies that States have a duty to improve all aspects of industrial hygiene. This includes “preventive measures in respect of occupational accidents and diseases … [and] the prevention and reduction of the population’s exposure to harmful substances such as radiation and harmful chemicals … that directly or indirectly impact upon human health”. 24 20. Everyone, including workers, has the right to physical integrity of their body. 25 This right encompasses the right of each human being to autonomy and self-determination over their own body, including over the entry of unwanted, toxic substances into their body, whether from occupational or other sources. Acute poisonings and other cases of extreme exposure to toxic substances present unquestionable violations of the right of workers to physical integrity, subjecting them to violent, cruel, inhuman and degrading forms of treatment. However, this right also extends to longer-term exposure to toxic substances, which can also give rise to violent, cruel, inhuman and degrading outcomes (A/HRC/22/53 and A/HRC/33/41). 21. Furthermore, workers have a right not to be subjected to scientific experimentation without their consent. 26 The exposure of workers to substances without sufficient information about whether they can cause cancer or harm a developing fetus when such information can be made available and accessible raises concerns that workers have been and continue to be subjected to a form of human experimentation. This right illustrates the importance of the right to information to enable the realization of the human rights of workers. 22. Under the rubric of the right to safe and healthy working conditions, the exposure of workers to toxic substances without their prior informed consent, with the real possibility of refusing to perform the hazardous activity, should be recognized as a violation and abuse of their rights. This is an essential part of the right of every worker to be protected from unsafe and unhealthy working conditions. The Special Rapporteur believes that every worker has an inherent right not to be exposed to toxic substances without their prior informed consent. In his view, this right is at the crux of the right to physical integrity, the right to information and the right not to be subjected to scientific experimentation without consent. 23. The ILO Promotional Framework for Occupational Safety and Health Convention, 2006 (No. 187) recognizes the right of workers to safe and healthy working conditions, although ILO does not include this right as a “fundamental right at work”. ILO implicitly recognizes the right of workers not to be exposed without their prior informed consent through recognition of the worker’s “right to remove themselves from danger resulting from the use of chemicals when they have reasonable justification to believe there is an imminent and serious risk to their safety or health”. 27 ILO has issued relevant recommendations to States, e.g. to put in place national policies, systems and programmes to prevent “occupational injuries, diseases and deaths … for the protection of all workers, in particular, workers in high-risk sectors, and vulnerable workers such as those in the informal economy and migrant and young workers”.28 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 6 Human Rights Committee, general comment No. 6 (1982) on the right to life. Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, general comment No. 14 (2000) on the highest attainable standard of health. Ibid. These fundamental rights also include respect for the physical and mental integrity of the worker in the exercise of his/her employment. Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, general comment No. 18. International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, art. 7. Chemicals Convention, 1990 (No. 170), art. 18. Promotional Framework for Occupational Safety and Health Recommendation, 2006 (No. 197); see also the ILO Constitution.