14 / 17
Page 57
conferenceseries
.com
Volume 5, Issue 2 (Suppl)
Occup Med Health Aff, an open access journal
ISSN: 2329-6879
Environmental Health 2017
September 7-8, 2017
September 7-8, 2017 | Paris, France
Environmental Health & Global Climate Change
2
nd
International Conference on
CHILDREN’S ENVIRONMENTAL RIGHTS ANDAGE DISCRIMINATION
Refia Kadayifci
a
a
Louvain University, Belgium
I
t is a well proved fact that environmental hazards produce more significant harms when children are affected. The main
objective of this paper is to demonstrate that the ‘right to equality and non-discrimination’ offers an appropriate, meaningful
and effective basis to protect children’s environmental health. Doing so requires answering whether there is a strong connection
between being children and being vulnerable to environmental degradation and if there is, whether anti-age discrimination
law opens a possible avenue to challenge this health disparity. I will refer to two different sources of children’s environmental
vulnerability: the disadvantaged situation of children in comparison with adults (
as an age group
) (this is also true for elders)
and particular disadvantage of the children who are recently born (as a birth cohort). I will argue that the ECtHR and the ECJ
anti-age discrimination case law reveal that children can be protected
as an age group
. And there are at least two legal strategies
to avoid birth cohort discrimination toward children: 2012 Commission v Hungary ECJ case strategy and 2014 Kaltoft v
Municipality of Billund ECJ case strategy. I will then demonstrate the environmental implications of these cases by giving
details about why this approach is significant and how it can be legally successful.
Occup Med Health Aff 2017, 5:2(Suppl)
DOI: 10.4172/2329-6879-C1-032