Browsing by Subject "Public Health Law"

Now showing 1 - 4 of 4
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    Contact Tracing, Intrastate and Interstate Quarantine, and Isolation
    (Public Health Law Watch, 2020-08) Silverman, Ross D.
    Contact tracing, quarantine and isolation are core communicable disease control measures used by public health departments as part of a comprehensive case ascertainment and management strategy. These are practices with historic roots enabled by state laws and policies, and have been used by other countries to slow and stop the spread of COVID-19. To date, their implementation as part of U.S. response efforts at the national, state, and local levels has been confounded by the scale of the COVID-19 outbreak; lack of a systemic infectious disease response; insufficient and fragmented funding streams; low levels of public accountability; and concerns about the impact of such efforts on individual privacy, liberty, and travel rights, as well as the financial and personal costs that may arise out of a positive diagnosis. Recommendations have been offered by expert groups on both the scaling up of contact tracing and ensuring ethical implementation of such measures. One state has passed legislation establishing an oversight framework for state contact tracing and associated data collection and use. Legal challenges to interstate quarantine rules have, thus far, been unsuccessful. Recommendations include: appropriating federal funding adequate to mount and sustain rapid, comprehensive, culturally-appropriate state and local testing, treatment, contact tracing, and supported quarantine and isolation service efforts; building contact tracing systems that cover social as well as health care supports for those affected; and, to bolster trust and participation in public health efforts, implement contact tracing-related health communication efforts targeted to reach the diverse array of communities affected by the epidemic.
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    Social Work as an Important Collaborator in Transdisciplinary Public Health Law: Why Does it Matter and Where Does it Fit?
    (Saint Louis University School of Law, 2019-12-06) Walter-McCabe, Heather A.; School of Social Work
    Public health law has been a growing field over the last few decades. From the early days of its initial recognition as an academic and professional field to its more recent texts and treatises, public health law is continuing to define itself. To that end, Burris et al. recently published two works describing a transdisciplinary model of public health law and five essential services of public health law. This article examines how the inclusion of social work in the model can be instrumental in forming better public health laws. The intentional inclusion of social work collaborators would supplement legal and public health expertise with expertise to meaningfully engage the community in law and policy development, implementation, and enforcement. Three areas specifically can be impacted by this engagement: (1) giving the community a voice in designing public health interventions in a way that increases buy-in; (2) using community organizing expertise to assist in getting evidence-based legal interventions with realistic enforcement mechanisms enacted into law at the local, state, or federal level; and (3) assisting in data collection for policy surveillance components by bringing in on-the-ground experts.
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    Stay at Home or Go Back to Work? Who Will Make the Decision?
    (Grow INdiana Media Ventures, 2020-04-16) Silverman, Ross D.; Terry, Nicolas P.; Health Policy and Management, School of Public Health
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