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Expanding Access To Patents For Covid-19, Jorge L. Contreras Aug 2020

Expanding Access To Patents For Covid-19, Jorge L. Contreras

Utah Law Faculty Scholarship

Two competing and linked sets of goals must be addressed when considering patent policy in response to a public health emergency. First is the allocation of existing resources among potential users (hospitals, patients, etc.); second is the creation of new technologies over time (innovation). Patents provide financial incentives to develop new technologies. Yet shortages of patented products often plague crisis response. In the case of COVID-19, allocative goals, particularly satisfying demand for patented medical products (e.g., vaccines, ventilators, PPE, and test kits), may be achieved through governmental interventions such as march-in and governmental use rights (compulsory licensing). But in cases …


Upholding Tribal Sovereignty And Promoting Tribal Public Health Capacity During The Covid-19 Pandemic, Heather Tanana, Aila Hoss Aug 2020

Upholding Tribal Sovereignty And Promoting Tribal Public Health Capacity During The Covid-19 Pandemic, Heather Tanana, Aila Hoss

Utah Law Faculty Scholarship

Tribes are sovereign nations with authorities and responsibilities over their land and people. This inherent sovereign authority includes the right to promote and protect the health and welfare of their communities. The COVID-19 pandemic has brought national attention to the health inequities experienced by American Indian and Alaska Native communities. The sovereign legal authority for Tribes to respond to this pandemic has received less attention. This Chapter describes some, but not all, of the urgent legal issues impacting Tribal response to the COVID-19 pandemic. It describes and identifies gaps in federal Indian health policies and highlights how Tribes have exercised …


Crisis At The Pregnancy Center: Regulating Pseudo-Clinics And Reclaiming Informed Consent, Teneille R. Brown Apr 2020

Crisis At The Pregnancy Center: Regulating Pseudo-Clinics And Reclaiming Informed Consent, Teneille R. Brown

Utah Law Faculty Scholarship

Crisis Pregnancy Centers (CPCs) adopt the look of medical practices — complete with workers in scrubs, ultrasound machines, and invasive physical exams — to deceive pregnant women into thinking they are being treated by licensed medical professionals. In reality, CPCs offer exclusively Bible-based, non-objective counseling. Numerous attempts to regulate CPCs have faced political roadblocks. Most recently, in NIFLA v. Becerra, the Supreme Court held that state efforts to require CPCs to disclose that they are not medically licensed are unconstitutional violations of CPCs’ First Amendment right to free speech. In the wake of that decision, pregnant women in crisis — …


Why We Fear Genetic Informants: Using Genetic Genealogy To Catch Serial Killers, Teneille R. Brown Apr 2020

Why We Fear Genetic Informants: Using Genetic Genealogy To Catch Serial Killers, Teneille R. Brown

Utah Law Faculty Scholarship

Consumer genetics has exploded, driven by the second-most popular hobby in the United States: genealogy. This hobby has been co-opted by law enforcement to solve cold cases, by linking crime-scene DNA with the DNA of a suspect's relative, which is contained in a direct-to-consumer (DTC) genetic database. The relative’s genetic data acts as a silent witness, or genetic informant, wordlessly guiding law enforcement to a handful of potential suspects. At least thirty murderers and rapists have been arrested in this way, a process which I describe in careful detail in this article. Legal scholars have sounded many alarms, and have …