[Human rights and procreation].

The impact of procreation on freedom, health and welfare of human beings, is considerable. This relationship, however, is not mirrored in texts devoted to Human Rights. This omission obviously implies a neglect of women's and children's rights. The history of anticonceptive methods exemplifies the struggle for these rights. This conquest, which has lasted two hundred years, is far from completed. Because of the demographic outbreak in Third World countries, an ideological conflict has appeared between first generation Human Rights concerned with individual freedom ("rights of") and those of second generation aiming at social fairness ("rights to"). Adequate political and economic adjustment between North and South is a prerequisite to any balanced compromise that would resolve this conflict through democratic, albeit intensive, birth control.