Health Law and Policy Commons^™

Environmental Health Regulation In The Trump Era: How President Trump’S Two-For-One Regulatory Plan Impacts Environmental Regulation, Elizabeth Ann Glass Geltman

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

This Article explores the Trump regulatory reform agenda and its potential impact on environmental determinants of health. The Article begins with a discussion of the Department of Commerce’s (DOC or Commerce) initial fact-finding investigation to evaluate the impact of federal regulations on domestic manufacturing. The Article next presents an overview of the Trump administration’s regulatory reform formula as announced in E.O. 13771 and the interim guidance explaining E.O. 13771 and E.O. 13777 (the executive order announcing the Trump administration’s plans to enforce the regulatory reform plan announced in E.O. 13771). The Article then examines the federal agency initiatives undertaken in …

Adoption Process For The Model Aquatic Health Code: An Example, William D. Ramos, Allison L. Fletcher, Mike Mettler, Marcus A. Yoder

International Journal of Aquatic Research and Education

In 2014 the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) published the first edition of the Model Aquatic Health Code (MAHC). This document represented the inaugural introduction of a federal policy guideline with a direct focus in the area of aquatic venue operation and maintenance with the sole purpose of improving the nature of public health in the field. The Indiana State Department of Health (ISDH) began the review and adoption process soon after the policy’s release. The ISDH process is proposed as one method for others to consider. The background and history of the MAHC are presented in …

Witch Doctors, Zombies, And Oracles: Rethinking Health In America, Ali S. Khan

Health Matrix: The Journal of Law-Medicine

To the extent we can even refer to an American healthcare "system," it functions brilliantly ... to make money. The system is designed to reward executives or major shareholders of pharmaceutical & health insurance companies, healthcare facilities, and related entities. With a rapidly aging population, healthcare will soon surpass a fifth of our economy. Of course, the American healthcare system does not function brilliantly when one considers the perspective of patients and over-extended primary care providers. Prices are growing faster than inflation or wages, healthcare is twice as costly as other comparable nations, and one third is a result of …

Prescriptions At A Price: America's Opioid Crisis And The Increasing Toll On Drug Record Privacy, Reem Blaik

Vanderbilt Journal of Entertainment & Technology Law

How should the US Constitution govern patient privacy in the face of a public health emergency? Declaring the United States' opioid crisis as a public health emergency may put the already-compromised integrity of drug record privacy at higher risk by virtue of emerging administrative responses, existing Supreme Court precedent, and acquiescent state laws. The White House convened a summit on opioids where the then-US attorney general discussed law enforcement responses to the crisis. Although the Fourth Amendment protects against unreasonable searches and seizures, the Supreme Court's third-party doctrine generally grants state and federal actors access to records released to third …

Fashioning Worker Protections To Combat The Thin Ideal's Cost On Fashion Models And Public Health, Erin E. Meyers

Vanderbilt Journal of Entertainment & Technology Law

Studies linking thin-obsessed media consumption to poor health outcomes for women have permeated the medical literature for years. The pressures female fashion models face to sacrifice their health for their jobs are perhaps even more disturbing. These harrowing issues are symptoms of the "thin ideal," the social norm glorifying a female body type so thin it is unattainable for most women. Despite the clear harm imposed by the thin ideal, the United States has done little to combat its effect on the working conditions of fashion models and on public health more generally. This Note suggests that the US fashion …

When Trade Secrecy Goes Too Far: Public Health And Safety Should Trump Corporate Profits, Julie E. Zink

Vanderbilt Journal of Entertainment & Technology Law

This Article addresses the historical and ongoing use of trade secrets to withhold critical information from the public. Through its text and footnotes, the Article discusses the positives and negatives of trade secret protection; addresses historical and current examples of trade secret abuse; analyzes the inadequate solutions that have been tried and proposed; and, ultimately, recommends changing trade secret law by incorporating the precautionary principle into the definition of a trade secret to ensure that protection will no longer be available for information that endangers public health.

This Article is both timely and necessary, as the public is continually bombarded …

Quarantine And The Federal Role In Epidemics, Michael R. Ulrich, Wendy K. Mariner

SMU Law Review

Every recent presidential administration has faced an infectious disease threat, and this trend is certain to continue. The states have primary responsibility for protecting the public’s health under their police powers, but modern travel makes diseases almost impossible to contain intrastate. How should the federal government respond in the future? The Ebola scare in the U.S. repeated a typical response—demands for quarantine. In January 2017, the Department of Health and Human Services and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued final regulations on its authority to issue Federal Quarantine Orders. These regulations rely heavily on confining persons who may …

Renovations Needed: The Fda's Floor/Ceiling Framework, Preemption, And The Opioid Epidemic, Michael R. Abrams

Michigan Law Review

The FDA’s regulatory framework for pharmaceuticals uses a “floor/ceiling” model: administrative rules set a “floor” of minimum safety, while state tort liability sets a “ceiling” of maximum protection. This model emphasizes premarket scrutiny but largely relies on the state common law “ceiling” to police the postapproval drug market. As the Supreme Court increasingly holds state tort law preempted by federal administrative standards, the FDA’s framework becomes increasingly imbalanced. In the face of a historic prescription medication overdose crisis, the Opioid Epidemic, this imbalance allows the pharmaceutical industry to avoid internalizing the public health costs of their opioid products. This Note …