Comments on the jurisprudence of the Constitutional Court of the Czech Republic on copyright

This paper focuses on the analysis of the application of the principles and provisions of constitutional law to the area of copyright in selected case law of the Constitutional Court of the Czech Republic and confirms their general importance, which manifested itself in the problems of legislation and case law during the Covid-19 pandemic. The starting point is to identify the principles and individual provisions of the constitutional law of the Czech Republic applicable to the protection of intangible objects of copyright, in particular the provisions of Art. 34, (1) Charter of Fundamental Rights and Freedoms of the Czech Republic on the protection of the results of creative intellectual activity. The aim is to find out how the Constitutional Court resolves conflicts between individual constitutional rights when they are infringed. Further goal is to consider the concept of constitutional protection of this field in the Czech Republic to compare with the concept of constitutional EU law and with international law. This will be done using the method of analysis and legal comparison.

The Rights to Life, Dignity and the Highest Attainable Standard of Health: Internationally Influential African Jurisprudence.

The right to the highest attainable standard of health, existing under a number of international human rights instruments, including Art 12 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, has been incorporated in local law and in the constitutions of many countries. An important body of jurisprudence interpreting such rights and applying them in particular factual health scenarios is developing. Against the background of the South African Constitutional Court's 2002 landmark decision in Minister of Health v Treatment Action Campaign (No 2) (2002) 5 SA 721 in relation to access to HIV medications, this editorial reviews significant decisions in 2012 by Ngugi J of the Kenya High Court in PAO v Attorney General [2012] eKLR and by the Uganda Constitutional Court in 2020 in Center for Health, Human Rights and Development v Attorney General [2020] UGCC 12. It contends that this combination of high-profile judgments has breathed substance and significance into the right to the highest attainable standard of health, the entitlement to be treated with dignity and the right to life at a time when these rights may assume additional importance in the context of the availability and accessibility of vaccines for the COVID-19 virus.