How Human Rights Apply to Medical Treatment
When you receive medical care in the UK, your human rights are protected by law. The Human Rights Act 1998 sets out fundamental rights that public bodies must respect, and this includes the NHS and local health authorities.
Because NHS trusts, hospitals and local health authorities are classed as public authorities under UK law, they have a legal duty to act in ways that are compatible with your human rights. Failing to do so could give rise to a legal claim, though outcomes depend heavily on the specific circumstances and legal advice should be sought.
Not every complaint about medical care amounts to a human rights issue. However, certain situations involving healthcare can raise genuine human rights concerns, and it helps to understand which rights are most likely to be relevant. It is worth noting that there has been ongoing political debate about potentially replacing the Human Rights Act with a British Bill of Rights, though the Act remains in force at present.
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Several rights protected by the Human Rights Act can apply in medical settings. The following are the ones most commonly relevant to healthcare situations.
- Article 2: The right to life. Public authorities have a duty to protect life. In healthcare, this can mean providing treatment that is necessary to keep someone alive, or taking reasonable steps to prevent avoidable deaths. It may also apply to decisions about withdrawing life sustaining treatment, which must follow proper legal and ethical processes. Cases involving end of life care have generated significant legal and public debate, illustrating how complex these questions can become when medical, ethical and legal considerations intersect.
- Article 3: The right not to be subjected to torture or inhuman or degrading treatment. Courts have consistently treated this right as absolute, meaning there should be no circumstances where degrading treatment is lawful. In medical contexts, this could apply to situations where a patient is left in severe pain without adequate care, or is treated in a way that causes humiliation or distress beyond what is medically necessary. Given the complexity of applying this in practice, anyone who believes they have experienced such treatment should seek specialist legal advice.
- Article 5: The right to liberty and security. People cannot usually be detained against their will. However, the law does allow for certain exceptions in medical situations. A person may lawfully be detained to prevent the spread of infectious diseases, or if they are assessed as being of unsound mind and meet the criteria for detention under mental health legislation. Any such detention must follow proper legal procedures. In care settings, the Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards under the Mental Capacity Act 2005 provide additional protections to ensure that restrictions on a person's liberty are lawful, necessary and proportionate.
- Article 8: The right to respect for private and family life. This right covers a wide range of matters, including bodily autonomy, personal choices about treatment, and the confidentiality of medical information. Healthcare providers must generally obtain informed consent before treatment and should respect patients' decisions about their own care, provided the patient has the mental capacity to make those decisions.
- Article 14: The right not to be discriminated against. This Article works alongside other rights in the Act. It means that public authorities must not discriminate in how they provide access to the other protected rights. In healthcare, this could apply if a person was denied treatment or given inferior care because of their race, sex, disability, age, religion or another protected characteristic.
Your situation may be slightly different. ask a question below ↓ and our editorial team will reply with our advice.
Capacity, Consent and Treatment Decisions
A recurring theme in medical human rights cases is the question of consent. Adults with mental capacity have the right to make their own decisions about treatment, even if others disagree with those decisions. This principle is protected under Article 8.
Where a person lacks capacity to make a particular decision, healthcare providers must act in their best interests. The Mental Capacity Act 2005 sets out how these assessments should be made in England and Wales. In Scotland, the Adults with Incapacity (Scotland) Act 2000 covers similar ground.
In some cases, disputes about treatment reach the courts. This can happen when there is disagreement between medical professionals and family members about what is in a patient's best interests, particularly in cases involving life sustaining treatment or end of life care.
Mental health treatment raises specific issues. Patients detained under the Mental Health Act 1983, as amended by the Mental Health Act 2007, may receive certain treatments without their consent, but there are safeguards in place. Some treatments require a second medical opinion or approval from a tribunal before they can be given to a patient who is refusing.
What to Do If You Have Concerns
If you believe your human rights have been breached during medical treatment, there are several steps you can take.
You may wish to raise a complaint directly with the healthcare provider first. NHS trusts have formal complaints procedures, and you can also contact the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman if you are not satisfied with the response. The Care Quality Commission regulates health and social care services in England and can be notified about serious concerns.
For advice on whether you might have a legal claim, consider speaking to a solicitor who specialises in human rights or clinical negligence law. Legal outcomes in this area are often uncertain and depend on the particular facts of each case. Some solicitors offer an initial consultation at no cost. You may also be able to get help through legal aid, depending on your circumstances and the nature of your case.
Organisations such as Liberty and the Equality and Human Rights Commission can provide general information about human rights issues, though they do not typically offer personal legal advice. For guidance on NHS complaints procedures, the NHS website and Citizens Advice offer practical information on the steps involved.
The NHS does not know my illness is life threatening or the tru nature of it. This is because my illness has been misrepresented by flawed research. The flaws have come to light however the misrepresentation has not been dealt with around the NHS so there is lots of stigma towards my illness.
I want to follow private treatment to get me better. I have no quality of life from this illness and I need hope that I can get better. However to get better I need additional social care and treatment. They are both interlinked. I can’t have one without the other. I have no been able to have a bedbath since April 2018 because of severe ill health.
I can’t get social care I need until I have an established primary health need. Ths is based on medical evidence.
I struggle to get medical evidence from the NHS and I have had to pay privately to get medical evidence.
However CHC would not take into account my private treatment or tests and this put my life at risk. But the risks are not recognised on the NHS. But without private treatment I could die.
The severe lack of quality of life has made me feel suicidal at times and I need hope that I will receive the help that I need.
The NHS will not support my private treatment. This means I am unable to access the NHS. As treatment interlinked with all my activity and communication and more.
I can't go on like it. Please give me the right to die.
4 years ago this aug I was treated for periphial t cell lymphoma stage 4. whilst having chemo I got cmv and in the death took the sight in my right eye. I was treated in hospital at the time but since I have been in remission I have had very bad flare up of cmv which have I believe lead to COPD and Phneumonia.
I have mentioned to the hemotologist im concerned about it, but no one has taken me seriously. no offer of blood checks (even if means sending to an expert. no medication, and no help from them whatso ever.
I have search the net for a few years and founda dr in USA who emailed me about a professor in London? how comes the hemotologist didn't use him. again I contacted them to say I was worried abt cmv. no one one offered any solutions but just tried to mug me off again. now I find yet another flare up. this time my own GP gave me meds on the advice of this professor I found and spoke to.he agreed to check my bloods for us and advise which meds.
so now I am on my 2nd month of meds, the cmv is slowly reducing in my blood tho it always leaves me exhausted. I have an appointment to see my hemo team and see what they are saying this time, because I believe this is a breach of my human rights. but im not an expert so please can someone enlighten me... where togo next or what to do, im so drained. thankin you all
there was no labling surrounding discontinuation (withdrawal problems) or the increased risk of aggression, lability and stastical increase in suicidal behaviour in children adults adolescents under 25. Infant and child trials showed most antidepressants
Ineffective in this age group. The pharmaceutical company's had this trial data and held it back and marketed them illegally for children If my parents would have known these points they would not have made the decision in my interest in terms of risk/harm Ratio just for childood anxiety. Im 26 still on these drugs unemployed have attempted suicide and have suffered immensely when attempting to discontinue these drugs
I have no idea what the long term effects on me are, and or on a developing brain. What are my human rights if I was a minor and how would you go about changing the law so that young persons have rights and are safeguarded and protected from iatregenic harm caused by greedy business in the pharma sector regarding psychotropic and other potentially harmful practices. Thanks for reading, email me if possible.
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