Summary
Upon going into labor, Ms. A.S., a member of the Roma community, needed an emergency Caesarian section. Immediately before the surgery, a doctor asked Ms. A.S. to sign consent forms on which the doctor had hand-written a statement that Ms. A.S. consented to a sterilization procedure. Ms. A.S. did not understand the statement or that she had been sterilized until after the operation took place. Her claim of civil rights violations and negligent sterilization was rejected at the local level. In her communication to the CEDAW Committee, it found that the Ms. A.S. exhausted her domestic remedies becauase under Hungarian law she was unable to appeal this decision to the Constitutional Court given the nature and facts of her case. Hungary was found to have violated Ms. A.S.’s rights to (1) fully informed consent to medical procedures; (2) right to information on family planning; (3) right to appropriate services in connection with pregnancy and the post-natal period; and (4) right to determine the number and spacing of her children, under Articles 10(h), 12 and 16(1)(e) of the Convention on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women. The Committee also found that the communication was admissible, even though the operation occurred before the Optional Protocol entered into force for Hungary, because sterilization was a continuous injury, and because sterilization is permanent, irreversible (despite the state’s claims) and success of reversal is low.
Keywords: A.S. v. Hungary, Communication No. 4/2004, CEDAW/C/36/D/4/2004, Cultural, Rights