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Statement on Acceptance of UNESCO Universal Declaration on Bioethics and Human Rights
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The United States is pleased to be able to join consensus on the Universal Declaration on Bioethics and Human Rights and urge that it be adopted by acclimation and without amendment. This document helps to provide a basic framework of ethical principles to guide Member States in the development of their domestic legislation and policies.
The United States believes it is particularly important that this Declaration is aimed at ensuring fundamental freedoms and respect for the life of human beings. The United States fully endorses the Declaration’s recognition that respect for human dignity and human rights requires respect for the life of human beings. The United States, moreover, applauds the primacy accorded to human dignity, which is the basis for human rights.
The negotiation of this document was difficult. We believe that the process in place was not best suited for developing a document of high quality that would attract a consensus of Member States. However, the spirit of mutual respect, willingness to listen to each other, and to compromise, and the effective leadership of a fair-minded Chair of the Intergovernmental Meeting of Experts made it possible to produce a document that, although far from perfect, is one we hope all member states can support. We are pleased to have been able to play a part in developing this consensus.
As stated in the Preamble, this Declaration is to be understood in a manner consistent with domestic and international law. The United States has long been a leader in applying bioethical principles to biomedical research and the delivery of health care. In our legislation, rules, court decisions, and administrative actins and policies, we have grappled with the many difficult issues that inevitably arise in implementation of the principles of the Declaration. We have joined the Declaration, therefore, on the basis of the understanding that the Declaration is to be understood in a manner consistent with our domestic law.
Alongside the ethical principles it states, the Declaration articulates the hope that progress in science and technology will advance the health and well being of the people of the world. These goals can be achieved only if innovators are assured that they will be rewarded for their genius, their effort, and the resources they devote to it. The United States, therefore, emphasizes, in accepting this
Declaration, the critical role that intellectual property, and the protection of it, play in fostering medical, scientific, and technological research and development, and in making the fruits of human creativity widely available. As recognized by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the right to own property is a basic right, on which so many others depend, and everyone has the right to the protection of the moral and material interests resulting from their scientific, literary or artistic production. Everyone benefits by the recognition and protection of those rights.
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