A/HRC/33/57 I. Introduction 1. In its resolution 30/4, the Human Rights Council requested the Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples to conduct a study on the right to health and indigenous peoples with a focus on children and youth and present it to the Council at its thirty-third session. 2. The Expert Mechanism called for States, indigenous peoples, national human rights institutions and other stakeholders to provide information for the study. The submissions received have been made available on the Expert Mechanism website whenever permission to do so has been granted. The study also benefited from presentations made at the Expert Seminar on Indigenous Peoples and the Right to Health (Montreal, Canada, 21-22 February 2016) organized by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and the Institute for the Study of International Development at McGill University. The Expert Mechanism would like to thank the University of Auckland Faculty of Law for providing research support. The Pan American Health Organization reviewed the study, provided comments and contributed to the text. 3. Although this is the first study of the Expert Mechanism focusing on the right to health, previous studies have addressed the links between access to justice and the health of indigenous women and indigenous persons with disabilities (A/HRC/27/65), the health implications for indigenous peoples of disaster risk reduction initiatives (A/HRC/27/66) and the importance of indigenous cultures and languages for the health of indigenous peoples (A/HRC/21/53). 4. Indigenous peoples’ conceptualization of health and well-being is generally broader and more holistic than that of mainstream society, with health frequently viewed as both an individual and a collective right, strongly determined by community, land and the natural environment. The Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues has noted that the right to health “materializes through the well-being of an individual as well as the social, emotional, spiritual and cultural well-being of the whole community” (see E/2013/43-E/C.19/2013/25, para. 4). Indigenous concepts of health often incorporate spiritual, emotional, cultural and social dimensions in addition to physical ones. Those concepts are inextricably linked with the realization of other rights, including the rights to self-determination, development, culture, land, language and the natural environment. 5. Indigenous peoples’ concept of health is frequently disregarded within nonindigenous health systems, however, creating significant barriers to access (see A/HRC/30/41, para. 31). In particular, a lack of understanding of social and cultural factors deriving from the health-related knowledge, attitudes and practices of indigenous peoples can have deleterious effects on indigenous well-being. Indigenous peoples worldwide experience higher rates of health risks, poorer health and greater unmet needs in respect of health care than their non-indigenous counterparts. Forced assimilation, political and economic marginalization, discrimination and prejudice, poverty and other legacies of colonialism have also led to a lack of control over individual and collective health. 6. A comprehensive analysis of the state of indigenous peoples’ health is beyond the scope of the present study, which contains, instead, a critical analysis of the content of the right to health vis-à-vis indigenous peoples and a review of the legal obligations of States and others in terms of fulfilling that right. 3