Abstract

Calum Alasdair Young takes up the emergent narrative of fundamental human rights, characterising this as an area of ‘frustrated potential’ for the future development of EU Health Law and Policy. The chapter lays out the role fundamental human rights play within EU law as a whole and analyses how fundamental human rights interact with EU Health Law and Policy. The EU’s Charter of Fundamental Rights forms part of the direction of travel. Fundamental human rights are a tool to interpret and a standard to review health policy; a potential source of increased access to healthcare; a potential health-based limitation on free movement; a way to frame health policy; and a potential source of EU health policy. However, despite these areas of interaction and the potential of Article 35 of the EU’s Charter of Fundamental Rights, on the right to healthcare, the main actors involved have repeatedly rejected the possibility of a fundamental human rights approach.