Alex Neve is the Secretary General of Amnesty International Canada
Absolutely everything about confronting the COVID-19 pandemic is connected to human rights. There can be little debate about that. But agreeing that human rights are at stake does not automatically mean they will be upheld. That requires concrete action. And that is why 301 organizations and experts across Canada have called on the country’s governments to institute human rights oversight.
After all, the virus attacks the very essence of the rights to health and to life. And there is certainly a need to focus on marginalized groups already subject to entrenched human rights abuse. Human rights concerns related to the pandemic’s impact on at-risk communities are indeed growing in Canada, including the devastating toll on the elderly, particularly in long-term care homes.
Closing the U.S.-Canada border has exposed refugee claimants to harsh immigration detention and risk of deportation to the United States. And many communities, including First Nations, people living with disabilities, racialized communities, women and children at risk of violence in the home, precariously-employed workers, sex workers and many others, are signalling heightened susceptibility to the virus, greater likelihood of surveillance and police enforcement, and increased hardship from isolation measures and economic fall-out. This is masked by a lack of usefully disaggregated statistics.
At the same time, it is vital to ensure that necessary limits on other rights arising from shutdowns, including livelihood and education rights, freedoms of movement and assembly, and restrictions on privacy, are carefully scrutinized to ensure they are legitimate and proportional.
All of this is why human rights groups, including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, have published comprehensive COVID-19 human rights frameworks for governments around the world. Human rights commissions across the country, including in Ontario and British Columbia, have offered guidance. United Nations leaders, notably the Secretary General and the High Commissioner for Human Rights, have underscored that global solidarity and respect for human rights must be central to COVID-19 responses. And the Canadian government, directly and jointly with 23 other countries, has stressed that protecting public health and human rights must go hand-in-hand. Read more via Macleans