Towards an international treaty on human rights and biomedicine? Some reflections inspired by UNESCO's Universal Declaration on Bioethics and Human Rights.

The 33 session of the General Conference of UNESCO has adopted by acclamation on 19 October 2005 the Universal Declaration on Bioethics and Human Rights. After the Universal Declaration on the Human Genome and Human Rights (1997), followed by the Universal Declaration on Human Genetic Data (2003), the Universal Declaration on Bioethics and Human Rights is the third instrument related to bioethics adopted by UNESCO. It is also the most encompassing until now. While the focus of the Universal Declarations of 1997 and 2003 has been on genetics and life sciences, the recently adopted Universal Declaration covers many areas of bioethics. According to article1 paragraph a, this Declaration addresses ethical issues related to medicine, life sciences and associated technologies as applied to human beings, taking into account their social, legal and environmental dimensions. The Universal Declaration on Bioethics and Human Rights contains 28 articles, divided over 5 titles. Articles 1 and 2 contain the “General Provisions”. The already cited article1 describes the scope of the Declaration while article 2 proclaims its eight aims. The backbone of the Declaration is made up by the “Principles”, spread over the articles 3 to 17. They range from topics that (European) health lawyers will recognize immediately – such as human dignity and human rights (article 3), benefit and harm (article 4), autonomy (article5), consent (article 6), persons without the capacity to consent (article 7), respect for human vulnerability and personal integrity (article 8), privacy and confidentiality (article 9), equality, justice and equity (article 10) and non-discrimination and non-stigmatization (article 11) – to themes they are in general less acquainted with such as respect for cultural diversity and pluralism (article 12), solidarity and cooperation (article 13), social responsibility and health (article 14), sharing of benefits (article 15), protecting future generations (article 16) and the protection of the environment, the biosphere and biodiversity (article 17). The next title, “Application of the Principles” deals with matters as decision-making and addressing bioethical issues (article 18), ethics