On Friday 22 April 2022, the National Human Rights Council (CNDH) presented its thematic report on the right to health, entitled: The effectiveness of the right to health in Morocco… Challenges and ways for its strengthening.
Representatives of the World Health Organization (WHO) office in Morocco, representatives of unions, professional bodies, representatives of civil society, media, and several actors took part in this event.
This report presents the obstacles faced by citizens to access their right to health. It also proposes approaches to address them, not only based on legal texts that guarantee the right to health but also by searching for obstacles related to the implicit determinants of the right to health, particularly the economic, social, cultural and environmental ones.
In her statement, Mrs. Amina Bouayach, CNDH Chairperson, recalled the methodology for elaborating this report which was based on a participatory approach. Several consultative meetings were held by the CNDH since the launch of this project in October 2020 in six regions.
Mrs. Bouayach also underlined that overcoming obstacles that hinder the enjoyment of this right could be realized by focusing on five main axes:
1- Strengthening governance at the level of decision-making mechanisms, hospital structures, financing, human resources and the pharmaceutical industry;
2- Building a health system based on a preventive approach;
3- Increasing beneficiaries of health coverage;
4- Improving the conditions for medical practice, training and scientific research;
5- Handling issues related to duplication of the health system.
At this event, Mrs. Bouayach also said that the CNDH concluded that the State has not yet been able, despite efforts, to ensure health security for citizens, in all its economic, social, environmental and cultural dimensions, whether with regard to access to health services, or developing a drug strategy that responds to national needs. Yet, she also noted positively the State's effort in the national vaccine campaign against Covid-19.
To overcome these issues, the CNDH Chairperson stressed that it is necessary to implement a new vision in which the State is the guarantor and defender of the right to health at the national and local levels. The State should ensure this right in accordance with its international and national obligations, particularly Chapter 31 of the Constitution which states that the State, public institutions and local authorities shall seek to muster all means available to facilitate equal access of citizens to their right to health care; ...
This report presents more than 100 recommendations for effective and equal access to the right to health. They are divided into legislative recommendations, recommendations related to the governance of the health sector and recommendations related to strengthening the preventive approach, etc.
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