They are your rights, assert them

THE CAMPAIGN "The decisions about your body, health and life belong to you. They are your rights, assert them” seeks to promote reflection on the agenda of sexual rights and reproductive rights and health and the impact it has on the daily life of people and, from there, encourage political parties to define their position on how to guarantee, respect and protect these rights in order for everybody to be able to exercise and defend them, without any kind of discrimination.

Sexual rights and reproductive rights and health, as universal and interdependent human rights, are issues that have been silenced by the political system that appears unable to grasp the impact that the lack of conditions for its full exercise has on the lives of people.

In order to exercise these rights each person must have the ability and power to make free, informed and responsible decisions on their sexuality and reproductive life. They must also have access to the necessary resources to safely and effectively put those decisions into practice, and without suffering any form of discrimination. Sexual and reproductive rights are, therefore, one of the axis along which citizenship is built and along which democratic coexistence is strengthened.

However, the Uruguayan State has many debts and pending actions towards its men and women.

• Voluntary abortion is an illegal practice that takes place under clandestine circumstances with high risks for the health, emotional and physical integrity, and life of women. According to available estimates, an abortion takes place every 20 minutes in Uruguay.
• Although access to contraception as a strategy to prevent unplanned and unwanted pregnancies has been incorporated into public health care services, the same is not true for private services. Until the National Integrated Health System incorporates access to a wide variety of safe and quality contraceptive methods –including reversible and irreversible methods–, the possibilities of many women (and their partners) to control their reproductive capacity will be restricted.
• In spite of the advances made in the care of pregnancy, delivery and puerperium, it is imperative to improve the quality of health care, increase the number of check-ups, early enrollment of pregnant women, reduce the number of unnecessary c-sections, congenital syphilis and HIV-AIDS.
• In Uruguay, HIV-AIDS is an epidemic that is largely concentrated in vulnerable groups: sexual workers, transsexuals, prisoners, IV drugs users, MSM). However, transmission is growing mainly among young people and women. People with HIV, including boys and girls, have trouble accessing antiretroviral treatment and clinical tests, and they continue to suffer discrimination and stigmatization in different social, work and family environments.
• Care provided to women who experience domestic and sexual violence, as a health care and human rights violations issue, has so far been inadequate and, although there is a greater involvement of the health care sector, the institutional response is weak and must be substantially improved.

Lesbians, gays, bisexuals, transsexuals and transvestites face prejudice, discrimination and violent messages on a daily basis, which has a negative impact on their full development as people and citizens. However, this is not viewed as a problem for the whole society.

For all these reasons and more, we believe it’s vital to contribute to the social and political debate on these issues, also in times of election campaigns, when political parties are presenting their government agendas.

The launch a Campaign to promote respect and guarantees for the full exercise of sexual rights and reproductive rights and health is a long-standing demand of citizens to which the political system is obliged to provide answers to solve current problems that affect quality of life of Uruguayan men and women.

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