A/69/267 beyond, including by improving affordability and accessibility, strengthening the learning environment; and honouring and expanding entitlements and opportunities. 19 62. In the area of health, persisting inequities in health status is an unfortunate commonality for all of the world’s indigenous peoples, with gaps not only in health status, but also in many determinants of health. Women and children face additional vulnerabilities. These are rooted in situations of extreme poverty, lack of access to education and social services, destruction of indigenous economies and sociopolitical structures, forced displacement, armed conflict and loss and degradation of customary lands and resources, all of which are further compounded by structural racism and discrimination. 63. The Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples emphasizes that indigenous peoples have the right to their traditional medicines and to maintain their health practices, including the conservation of their vital medicinal plants, animals and minerals (article 24(1)). The importance of such practices is reaffirmed by the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) and the World Health Organization (WHO), which estimate that 80 per cent of the population in developing countries relies on traditional healing systems as their primary source of care. 20 This number undoubtedly includes many indigenous people, who often rely on a combination of traditional and western medicines and practices, and points to the need for developing inclusive health strategies in partnership with indigenous peoples. 64. Within the United Nations system, PAHO, which is the specialized health agency of the inter-American system and the Regional Office of WHO for the Americas, has been the champion in promoting complementarity between traditional and western health systems and establishing alliances with traditional healers in order to incorporate their perspectives, medicines and therapies into national health systems. PAHO has stressed the need to develop comprehensive health strategies that reposition health and health services, taking into account structural social determinants, and that promote the collective human rights of indigenous peoples, eliminate discrimination and redistribute political and economic power towards a more diverse and equitable world. 21 65. The Special Rapporteur agrees with these calls for broad, multifac eted and contextualized legal, policy and programme responses to overcoming discrimination against indigenous peoples and to furthering their self-determination with regard to health and education. This requires coordinated and systematic actions by States , actions which acknowledge and conceptualize the indivisibility and interdependence of human rights and also correspond to indigenous peoples’ holistic and integrated perceptions of development and well-being. __________________ 19 20 21 14-58847 Ibid., p. 272-273. PAHO/WHO, resolution 47/13, Health of the Indigenous Peoples of the Americas, available at: http://www2.PAHO/WHO.org/hq/dmdocuments/2009/CD47-13-e.pdf. See ECLAC, PAHO/WHO and the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), Mortalidad infantil y en la niñez de pueblos indígenas y afrodescendientes de América Latina: inequidades estructurales, patrones diversos y evidencia de derechos no cumplidos , United Nations (2010). 17/23