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The Pandemic And The Public Nuisance: Judicial Intervention In The Era Of Covid-19 And The Collective Right To Public Health, Kyra Ziesk-Socolov
The Pandemic And The Public Nuisance: Judicial Intervention In The Era Of Covid-19 And The Collective Right To Public Health, Kyra Ziesk-Socolov
Washington and Lee Journal of Civil Rights and Social Justice
Amidst the unprecedented disruption caused by COVID-19, workplace lawsuits around the country began to apply a longstanding common law theory in a novel way: employee plaintiffs argued that their employers’ noncompliance with state and federal public health guidance designed to curb the spread of the virus should be enjoined as a public nuisance. Although some of these initial public nuisance suits were dismissed, others successfully forced defendant businesses to either alter their COVID safety practices or temporarily close. This Article explores the first pandemic-era public nuisance suit, Rural Community Workers Alliance v. Smithfield Foods, brought by meatpacking plant workers …