Law Commons^™

The Shared Ethical Framework To Allocate Scarce Medical Resources: A Lesson From Covid-19, Ezekiel J. Emanuel, Govind C. Persad

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

The COVID-19 pandemic has helped to clarify the fair and equitable allocation of scarce medical resources, both within and among countries. The ethical allocation of such resources entails a three-step process: (1) elucidating the fundamental ethical values for allocation, (2) using these values to delineate priority tiers for scarce resources, and (3) implementing the prioritisation to faithfully realise the fundamental values. Myriad reports and assessments have elucidated five core substantive values for ethical allocation: maximising benefits and minimising harms, mitigating unfair disadvantage, equal moral concern, reciprocity, and instrumental value. These values are universal. None of the values are sufficient alone, …

Era Project Summary Of Argument Before Pa Supreme Court On Whether Medicaid Abortion Ban Amounts To Sex Discrimination, Center For Gender And Sexuality Law

Center for Gender & Sexuality Law

This morning, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court heard oral arguments in Allegheny Reproductive Health Center v. Pennsylvania Department of Human Services, a case in which reproductive rights advocates have challenged the state’s ban on Medicaid funding for abortion (Coverage Ban), arguing that the ban violates the state constitution’s explicit prohibitions against sex discrimination.

Statement From Columbia Law School’S Center For Gender And Sexuality Law On The Supreme Court Decision Overruling The Constitutional Right To Abortion, Center For Gender And Sexuality Law

Center for Gender & Sexuality Law

The Supreme Court opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization signals a major break with at least three generations of constitutional law. This opinion eliminates not only constitutional protections for abortion, but well-settled legal principles on which fundamental rights have rested for over 60 years. “Within a 24-hour period the Supreme Court ruled on the one hand that abortion rights are a local issue to be decided by each state independently, while on the other, states are barred from making local decisions about how to regulate guns,” said Katherine Franke, James L. Dohr Professor of Law and Director of …

An Attempt To Bring Modern Workplace Realities To The Social Security Disability Adjudication System, Robert E. Rains

Dickinson Law Review (2017-Present)

No abstract provided.

Religious Liberty Challenges To Health Care In The Age Of Covid-19 – Supreme Court Arguments In Little Sisters Of The Poor V. Pennsylvania, Law, Rights, And Religion Project

Center for Gender & Sexuality Law

On Wednesday, May 6, 2020 the Supreme Court will be hearing arguments (telephonically) in the most recent challenge to the Affordable Care Act’s requirement that employee health plans include contraception coverage, Little Sisters of the Poor v. Pennsylvania. The case raises the important question of whether religious liberty rights can be used to limit access to health care at a time when the nation – and the world – is experiencing one of the worst global pandemics in human history. For this reason, the issues in this case take on special significance.

Health Care's Market Bureaucracy, Allison K. Hoffman

All Faculty Scholarship

The last several decades of health law and policy have been built on a foundation of economic theory. This theory supported the proliferation of market-based policies that promised maximum efficiency and minimal bureaucracy. Neither of these promises has been realized. A mounting body of empirical research discussed in this Article makes clear that leading market-based policies are not efficient — they fail to capture what people want. Even more, this Article describes how the struggle to bolster these policies — through constant regulatory, technocratic tinkering that aims to improve the market and the decision-making of consumers in it — has …

Intellectual Property And Public Health – A White Paper, Ryan G. Vacca, Jim Chen, Jay Dratler Jr., Tom Folsom, Timothy Hall, Yaniv Heled, Frank Pasquale, Elizabeth Reilly, Jeff Samuels, Kathy Strandburg, Kara Swanson, Andrew Torrance, Katharine Van Tassel

Katharine Van Tassel

On October 26, 2012, the University of Akron School of Law’s Center for Intellectual Property and Technology hosted its Sixth Annual IP Scholars Forum. In attendance were thirteen legal scholars with expertise and an interest in IP and public health who met to discuss problems and potential solutions at the intersection of these fields. This report summarizes this discussion by describing the problems raised, areas of agreement and disagreement between the participants, suggestions and solutions made by participants and the subsequent evaluations of these suggestions and solutions.

Led by the moderator, participants at the Forum focused generally on three broad …

Intellectual Property And Public Health – A White Paper, Ryan G. Vacca, Jim Chen, Jay Dratler Jr., Tom Folsom, Timothy Hall, Yaniv Heled, Frank Pasquale, Elizabeth Reilly, Jeff Samuels, Kathy Strandburg, Kara Swanson, Andrew Torrance, Katharine Van Tassel

Akron Law Faculty Publications

On October 26, 2012, the University of Akron School of Law’s Center for Intellectual Property and Technology hosted its Sixth Annual IP Scholars Forum. In attendance were thirteen legal scholars with expertise and an interest in IP and public health who met to discuss problems and potential solutions at the intersection of these fields. This report summarizes this discussion by describing the problems raised, areas of agreement and disagreement between the participants, suggestions and solutions made by participants and the subsequent evaluations of these suggestions and solutions.

Led by the moderator, participants at the Forum focused generally on three broad …

Intellectual Property And Public Health – A White Paper, Ryan G. Vacca, Jim Chen, Jay Dratler Jr., Tom Folsom, Timothy Hall, Yaniv Heled, Frank Pasquale, Elizabeth Reilly, Jeff Samuels, Kathy Strandburg, Kara Swanson, Andrew Torrance, Katharine Van Tassel

Ryan G. Vacca

On October 26, 2012, the University of Akron School of Law’s Center for Intellectual Property and Technology hosted its Sixth Annual IP Scholars Forum. In attendance were thirteen legal scholars with expertise and an interest in IP and public health who met to discuss problems and potential solutions at the intersection of these fields. This report summarizes this discussion by describing the problems raised, areas of agreement and disagreement between the participants, suggestions and solutions made by participants and the subsequent evaluations of these suggestions and solutions.

Led by the moderator, participants at the Forum focused generally on three broad …

Intellectual Property And Public Health – A White Paper, Ryan G. Vacca, James Ming Chen, Jay Dratler Jr., Thomas Folsom, Timothy S. Hall, Yaniv Heled, Frank A. Pasquale, Elizabeth A. Reilly, Jeffery Samuels, Katherine J. Strandburg, Kara W. Swanson, Andrew W. Torrance, Katharine A. Van Tassel

Faculty Scholarship

On October 26, 2012, the University of Akron School of Law’s Center for Intellectual Property and Technology hosted its Sixth Annual IP Scholars Forum. In attendance were thirteen legal scholars with expertise and an interest in IP and public health who met to discuss problems and potential solutions at the intersection of these fields. This report summarizes this discussion by describing the problems raised, areas of agreement and disagreement between the participants, suggestions and solutions made by participants and the subsequent evaluations of these suggestions and solutions. Led by the moderator, participants at the Forum focused generally on three broad …

Intellectual Property And Public Health – A White Paper, Ryan G. Vacca, Jim Chen, Jay Dratler Jr., Tom Folsom, Timothy Hall, Yaniv Heled, Frank Pasquale, Elizabeth Reilly, Jeff Samuels, Kathy Strandburg, Kara Swanson, Andrew Torrance, Katharine Van Tassel

Frank A. Pasquale

On October 26, 2012, the University of Akron School of Law’s Center for Intellectual Property and Technology hosted its Sixth Annual IP Scholars Forum. In attendance were thirteen legal scholars with expertise and an interest in IP and public health who met to discuss problems and potential solutions at the intersection of these fields. This report summarizes this discussion by describing the problems raised, areas of agreement and disagreement between the participants, suggestions and solutions made by participants and the subsequent evaluations of these suggestions and solutions.

Led by the moderator, participants at the Forum focused generally on three broad …

Intellectual Property And Public Health – A White Paper, Ryan G. Vacca, Jim Chen, Jay Dratler Jr., Tom Folsom, Timothy Hall, Yaniv Heled, Frank Pasquale, Elizabeth Reilly, Jeff Samuels, Kathy Strandburg, Kara Swanson, Andrew Torrance, Katharine Van Tassel

Katharine Van Tassel

On October 26, 2012, the University of Akron School of Law’s Center for Intellectual Property and Technology hosted its Sixth Annual IP Scholars Forum. In attendance were thirteen legal scholars with expertise and an interest in IP and public health who met to discuss problems and potential solutions at the intersection of these fields. This report summarizes this discussion by describing the problems raised, areas of agreement and disagreement between the participants, suggestions and solutions made by participants and the subsequent evaluations of these suggestions and solutions.

Led by the moderator, participants at the Forum focused generally on three broad …

Intellectual Property And Public Health – A White Paper, Ryan G. Vacca, Jim Chen, Jay Dratler Jr., Tom Folsom, Timothy Hall, Yaniv Heled, Frank Pasquale, Elizabeth Reilly, Jeff Samuels, Kathy Strandburg, Kara Swanson, Andrew Torrance, Katharine Van Tassel

Yaniv Heled

On October 26, 2012, the University of Akron School of Law’s Center for Intellectual Property and Technology hosted its Sixth Annual IP Scholars Forum. In attendance were thirteen legal scholars with expertise and an interest in IP and public health who met to discuss problems and potential solutions at the intersection of these fields. This report summarizes this discussion by describing the problems raised, areas of agreement and disagreement between the participants, suggestions and solutions made by participants and the subsequent evaluations of these suggestions and solutions.

Led by the moderator, participants at the Forum focused generally on three broad …

An O’Neill Institute Briefing Paper: The Supreme Court’S Landmark Decision On The Affordable Care Act: Healthcare Reform’S Ultimate Fate Remains Uncertain, Emily W. Parento, Lawrence O. Gostin

O'Neill Institute Papers

The Supreme Court’s decision on the constitutionality of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) is a landmark on the path toward ensuring universal access to health care in the United States. In a 5-4 decision written by Chief Justice Roberts, the Court upheld the law in its entirety with the sole exception that Congress may not revoke existing state Medicaid funding to penalize states that decline to participate in the Medicaid expansion under the ACA. In this O’Neill Institute Briefing, we explain and analyze the Court’s decision, focusing on the individual purchase mandate and the Medicaid expansion, while …

Healthcare Reform Hangs In The Balance, Lawrence O. Gostin

O'Neill Institute Papers

In this timely new briefing, Professor Lawrence O. Gostin, University Professor and Faculty Director, O’Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law, Georgetown University writes:

Prior to Tuesday’s arguments, I believed that the Supreme Court would uphold the health insurance purchase mandate by a comfortable margin. But now I believe that health care reform hangs in the balance. Here are the key arguments on which the future of President Obama’s health care reform depends: a greater freedom, cost-shifting, the health care market, acts versus omissions, limiting principles, the population-base approach, and what is necessary and proper. If the Court strikes …

Why The Affordable Care Act's Individual Purchase Mandate Is Both Constitutional And Indispensable To The Public Welfare, Lawrence O. Gostin

O'Neill Institute Papers

Integral to the Affordable Care Act's (ACA’s) conceptual design is the individual purchase mandate, which requires most individuals to pay an annual tax penalty if they do not have health insurance by 2014. Despite the vociferous opposition, the mandate is the most “market-friendly” financing device because it relies on the private sector. Ironically, less market-oriented reforms such as a single-payer system clearly would have been constitutional.

It is common sense for everyone to purchase health insurance and thus gain security against the potentially catastrophic costs of treating a serious illness or injury. However, Congress’ method of ensuring that everyone has …

Improving The Population’S Health: The Affordable Care Act And The Importance Of Integration, Lorian E. Hardcastle, Katherine L. Record, Peter D. Jacobson, Lawrence O. Gostin

O'Neill Institute Papers

Heath care and public health are typically conceptualized as separate, albeit overlapping, systems. Health care’s goal is the improvement of individual patient outcomes through the provision of medical services. In contrast, public health is devoted to improving health outcomes in the population as a whole through health promotion and disease prevention. Health care services receive the bulk of funding and political support, while public health is chronically starved of resources. In order to reduce morbidity and mortality, policymakers must shift their attention to public health services and to the improved integration of health care and public health. In other words, …

Health Insurance, Risk, And Responsibility After The Patient Protection And Affordable Care Act, Tom Baker

All Faculty Scholarship

This essay explores the new social contract of healthcare solidarity through private ownership, markets, choice, and individual responsibility embodied in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. This essay first explains the four main health care risk distribution institutions affected by the Act – Medicare, Medicaid, the individual and small employer market, and the large group market – with an emphasis on how the Act changes those institutions and how they are financed. The essay then describes the “fair share” approach to health care financing embodied in the Act. This approach largely rejects the actuarial fairness vision of what constitutes …

Colloquium - Gender, Law And Health Care: New Perspectives For Teaching And Scholarship: The Role Of Gender In Law And Health Care, Karen H. Rothenberg

Karen H. Rothenberg

No abstract provided.

Lisa Schechtman On Reproductive Health And Human Rights: Integrating Medicine, Ethics, And Law By Rebecca J. Cook, Bernard M. Dickens, And Mahmoud F. Fathalla. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003. 554 Pp., Lisa Schechtman

Human Rights & Human Welfare

A review of:

Reproductive Health and Human Rights: Integrating Medicine, Ethics, and Law by Rebecca J. Cook, Bernard M. Dickens, and Mahmoud F. Fathalla. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003. 554 pp.

Unequal Access: The Crisis Of Health Care Inequality For Low-Income African-American Residents Of The District Of Columbia, Robyn Whipple Diaz

Journal of Health Care Law and Policy

No abstract provided.

Access To Health, Natalie Huls

Human Rights & Human Welfare

Access to health is an often-overlooked aspect of the right to health. Without practical access, the right to health becomes an empty promise. International human rights conventions and declarations do not directly mention access to health, but the above comment on the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights does address the issue.

Colloquium - Gender, Law And Health Care: New Perspectives For Teaching And Scholarship: The Role Of Gender In Law And Health Care, Karen H. Rothenberg

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Foreword: Public Health & The Law—A Symposium Dedicated To Professor William J. Curran, Lawrence O. Gostin

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

This essay serves as the foreword to Public Health & the Law, a symposium dedicated to Professor William J. Curran held in 1987.

During his career, Professor Curran chaired the Harvard School of Public Health Committee on Human Research; he directed the Program in Law and Public Health; and he was co-director of the Harvard Interfaculty Program in Medical Ethics from 1973 to 1980. He was also an advisor to the World Health Organization and spent two sabbatical periods in Europe with WHO organizations. He advised and lectured in countries throughout the world.

At Harvard Law School and at …