Public Health Law and Policy

Catalog description

Laws and policies shape public health in profound ways. The U.S. Constitution frames and limits government authority to protect and promote public health. It also provides protections for individual rights that often are in tension with public health’s focus on the common good. Federal, state and local laws and policies structure the distribution of society’s resources and—as interpreted, implemented and enforced—can have serious implications for health equity. The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed deeply polarized views among Americans about the role of government in public health and has laid bare vast structural health inequities. This course will explore the Constitutional foundations of public health law; how public health powers are distributed across different levels and branches of government; legal and policy strategies for addressing infectious and chronic diseases and injuries; and the role of laws and policies in structuring—and remedying—health inequities.