Important links between health and human rights are increasingly being recognised and human rights can be viewed as one of the social determinants of health. Furthermore, a human rights framework provides an excellent foundation for advocacy on health inequalities, a value-based alternative to views of health as a commodity, and the opportunity to move away from public health action being based on charity.This text introduces readers to human rights systems existing at global, regional and national levels and demonstrates how rights based approaches can be useful across health and social welfare arenas ' from the level of the interaction between an individual professional and their client up to global health policy and health related policies in other sectors. It explores how human rights analysis provide us with an important tool to help scrutinise the human rights effects ' both intended and unintended ' of different health related policies programs and interventions, and can be used to design policies and programmes to better support reductions in health inequities. Global in its scope, Health Equality and Human Rights presents examples from all regions of the world to illustrate the successful use of human rights approaches in fields such as HIV/AIDS, improving accessibility to essential drugs, reproductive health, women's health, and improving the health of marginalised and disadvantaged groups.Understanding human rights and their interrelationships with health and health equity is essential for public health and health promotion practitioners, as well as being important for a wide range of other health and social welfare professionals. This text is valuable reading for students, practitioners and researchers concerned with combating health inequalities and promoting social justice.