Health Law and Policy Commons^™

Under Observation: Wilson V. Inthachak Shows That Georgia’S Emergency Care Statute Still Lacks A Uniform Interpretation, Thomas S. Kiser

Mercer Law Review

This year, pro- and anti-tort reform forces met on the battleground of O.C.G.A. § 51-1-29.5(c), a statute that gives doctors increased protection from malpractice claims when they provide “emergency medical care in a hospital emergency department . . . .” When healthcare providers or hospitals are sued for negligence under these circumstances, the plaintiff must have clear and convincing evidence that the provider was grossly negligent, a greater hurdle than an ordinary medical malpractice plaintiff would need to overcome. While the statute is crystal clear in its purpose, Georgia courts have not reached a consensus regarding its application. Wilson v. …

Silent Suffering: Demanding Individual Accountability For Sexual Assault Against Disabled Children In School Environments, Stephanie Flores

Journal of Law and Policy

Disabled children are among the most vulnerable in society, particularly in school environments where they depend on the actions and care of others for their safety. These children face significantly higher risks of sexual abuse than their non-disabled peers, and school officials' negligence can exacerbate this danger. Despite the prevalence of such cases, the Fifth Circuit's refusal to recognize school officials’ liability under the state-created danger doctrine, as seen in Fisher v. Moore, deprives disabled children of adequate legal recourse under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. The decision holds that school officials cannot be held personally liable for the peer-inflicted sexual …

Prescription Practices, Anti-Psychotics, And Covid-19: An Intersectional Examination Of The Long-Term Care Home Setting In Canada, Olivia Ramos

Dalhousie Journal of Legal Studies

Public discourse and concern over the state of long-term care homes in Canada has been ongoing over the last two decades. One of the main sources of these concerns is the off-label prescription of anti-psychotic medications to long-term care home residents. Off-label use of pharmaceuticals is common and can be beneficial in certain contexts, however, there is a risk of anti-psychotics being used as an inappropriate means of managing patients chemically in the long-term care home setting. This paper engages in three lines of inquiry: first, the regulatory landscape of on and off-label prescription in Canada; second, the off-label use …

Bridging The False Certification Gap: Why “Resulting From” In The 2010 Aks Amendment Requires But-For Causation, Alexandra Wildman

Fordham Law Review

Before 2010, violators of the Anti-Kickback Statute (AKS) could avoid False Claims Act (FCA) liability if claims for items or services borne of their kickback scheme were submitted to federal healthcare programs by a third party. In 2010, as part of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), Congress attempted to close this loophole in the FCA by amending the AKS. Under the amendment’s terms, claims submitted to federal healthcare programs for items or services “resulting from” an AKS scheme are false for the purposes of establishing FCA liability, regardless of who submitted the claims.

Although the amendment widened the FCA liability …

Liability For Use Of Artificial Intelligence In Medicine, Nicholson W. Price Ii, Sara Gerke, I. Glenn Cohen

Book Chapters

While artificial intelligence (AI) has substantial potential to improve medical practice, errors will certainly occur, sometimes resulting in injury. Who will be liable? Questions of liability for AI-related injury raise not only immediate concerns for potentially liable parties but also broader systemic questions about how AI will be developed and adopted. The landscape of liability is complex, involving healthcare providers and institutions and the developers of AI systems. In this chapter, we consider these three principal loci of liability. At the outset, we note a few issues that shape our analysis.

Covid-19 Tort Reform, Clayton J. Masterman

Journal Articles

In 2020 and 2021, 44 states and Washington, D.C. passed laws that limited tort liability related to COVID-19. The most common reforms immunized health care providers from malpractice or similar liability. A second category is limited liability to individuals or businesses for exposing others to the novel coronavirus. And a third category protected manufacturers of supplies used to detect and prevent COVID- 19 from products liability suits. The goals of these reforms included protecting health care providers from uncertainty in providing care for a novel disease, limiting the macroeconomic consequences of the pandemic, and encouraging the distribution of critical supplies …

More Than Troubling: The Alarming Absence Of ‘Troubled Teen Industry’ Regulation And Proposals For Reform, Morgan Rubino

Journal of Legislation

This Note will advocate for immediate and wide-reaching legislative action on juvenile residential treatment. Part I will provide a brief history of the origins of the Troubled Teen Industry ("TTI") and the most common types of facilities operating today. Part II will analyze some of the limited state legislation on the TTI, along with the Stop Institutional Child Abuse Act pending before Congress. Finally, Part III will lay out the most pressing injustices and abuses that arise out of the TTI and argue that an integrated framework of local and federal legislation, including the adoption of state bills of rights …

"I Am Become Death, The Destroyer Of Worlds": Applying Strict Liability To Artificial Intelligence As An Abnormally Dangerous Activity, Renee Henson

Faculty Publications

Artificial intelligence (AI)-enabled tools have produced a myriad of injuries, up to and including death. This burgeoning technology has caused scholars to ask questions, such as, How do we create a legal framework for AI? Because AI creators have acknowledged that even they do not know the capacities of their technology for good or bad outcomes, this Article argues that an existing framework, strict liability, is an appropriate fit for harms arising from this new technology because a party need not prove negligence to prevail. Strict liability was uniquely developed to handle those activities that are “abnormally dangerous.” An abnormally …

Lending A Hand: The Use Of The Mississippi Products Liability Act And Mississippi's Blood Shield Statute In Palermo V. Lifelink Found., Inc., Taylor Price

MC Law Review

The experience of undergoing a surgical procedure is one of the most vulnerable positions an average individual finds themselves in during his or her lifetime. The overall risk associated with this process is even greater when the surgery involves the removal or transfer of one or more of the body's organs or tissues. The principal event that concerned Palermo v. LifeLink Found., Inc. was a botched surgical operation featuring a human tissue implant performed in March 2005 on Richard Palermo. The tissue implant surgically inserted into Palermo's knee became bacterially infected shortly after the operation and required further injury, causing …

The Need For Fentanyl-Specific Drug Education In Schools, Emma Guggenheimer

Cardozo Journal of Equal Rights & Social Justice

The note advocates for the implementation of state legislation requiring fentanyl-specific drug education in K-12 schools to combat the escalating opioid epidemic, particularly among teenagers. It emphasizes the critical role of schools in providing comprehensive education to raise awareness about the dangers of fentanyl and prevent overdose deaths. The proposal includes mandates for fentanyl-awareness campaigns, updated curricula, and the use of tools like fentanyl test strips and naloxone in schools.

No Need To Reinvent The Wheel: The Positive Relationship Between Green Technology And Patent Enforcement, Addison S. Fowler

Villanova Environmental Law Journal (1991 - )

No abstract provided.

A History Of Corporate Law Federalism In The Twentieth Century, William W. Bratton

Seattle University Law Review

This Article describes the emergence of corporate law federalism across a long twentieth century. The period begins with New Jersey’s successful initiation of charter competition in 1888 and ends with the enactment of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act in 2002. The federalism in question describes the interrelation of state and federal regulation of corporate internal affairs. This Article takes a positive approach, pursuing no normative bottom line. It makes six observations: (1) the federalism describes a division of subject matter, with internal affairs regulated by the states and securities issuance and trading regulated by the federal government; (2) the federalism is an …

Stakeholder Capitalism’S Greatest Challenge: Reshaping A Public Consensus To Govern A Global Economy, Leo E. Strine Jr., Michael Klain

Seattle University Law Review

The Berle XIV: Developing a 21st Century Corporate Governance Model Conference asks whether there is a viable 21st Century Stakeholder Governance model. In our conference keynote article, we argue that to answer that question yes requires restoring—to use Berle’s term—a “public consensus” throughout the global economy in favor of the balanced model of New Deal capitalism, within which corporations could operate in a way good for all their stakeholders and society, that Berle himself supported.

The world now faces problems caused in large part by the enormous international power of corporations and the institutional investors who dominate their governance. These …

Henderson And The Objective Observer Standard: The Future Of Race-Conscious Standards Post-Students For Fair Admissions, Gabriela Dionisio

Seattle University Law Review

On June 29, 2023, the Supreme Court of the United States decided Students for Fair Admissions v. President & Fellows of Harvard College, which struck down race-conscious admissions policies. Within just a year after its ruling, Students for Fair Admissions has already had a sweeping impact, reaching beyond higher education. Although the Supreme Court did not indicate whether Students for Fair Admissions applies to sectors beyond higher education, law firms, and other employers have already modified their diversity policies and initiatives, erasing race and company diversity considerations. Given those dramatic changes, there is growing fear that Students for Fair Admissions …

Same Crime, Different Time: Sentencing Disparities In The Deep South & A Path Forward Under The Fourteenth Amendment, Hailey M. Donovan

Seattle University Law Review

The United States has the highest incarceration rate of any country in the world. The American obsession with crime and punishment can be tracked over the last half-century, as the nation’s incarceration rate has risen astronomically. Since 1970, the number of incarcerated people in the United States has increased more than sevenfold to over 2.3 million, outpacing both crime and population growth considerably. While the rise itself is undoubtedly bleak, a more troubling truth lies just below the surface. Not all states contribute equally to American mass incarceration. Rather, states have vastly different incarceration rates. Unlike at the federal level, …

The Need For Corporate Guardrails In U.S. Industrial Policy, Lenore Palladino

Seattle University Law Review

U.S. politicians are actively “marketcrafting”: the passage of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, the CHIPS and Science Act, and the Inflation Reduction Act collectively mark a new moment of robust industrial policy. However, these policies are necessarily layered on top of decades of shareholder primacy in corporate governance, in which corporate and financial leaders have prioritized using corporate profits to increase the wealth of shareholders. The Administration and Congress have an opportunity to use industrial policy to encourage a broader reorientation of U.S. businesses away from extractive shareholder primacy and toward innovation and productivity. This Article examines discrete opportunities within the …

Securities Regulation And Administrative Deference In The Roberts Court, Eric C. Chaffee

Seattle University Law Review

In A History of Securities Law in the Supreme Court, A.C. Pritchard and Robert B. Thompson write, “Securities law offers an illuminating window into the Supreme Court’s administrative law jurisprudence over the last century. The securities cases provide one of the most accessible illustrations of key transitions of American law.” A main reason for this is that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is a bellwether among administrative agencies, and as a result, A History of Securities Law in the Supreme Court is a history of administrative law in the Supreme Court of the United States as well.

Delegated Corporate Voting And The Deliberative Franchise, Sarah C. Haan

Seattle University Law Review

Starting in the 1930s with the earliest version of the proxy rules, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has gradually increased the proportion of “instructed” votes on the shareholder’s proxy card until, for the first time in 2022, it required a fully instructed proxy card. This evolution effectively shifted the exercise of the shareholder’s vote from the shareholders’ meeting to the vote delegation that occurs when the share-holder fills out the proxy card. The point in the electoral process when the binding voting choice is communicated is now the execution of the proxy card (assuming the shareholder completes the card …

Capitalism Stakeholderism, Christina Parajon Skinner

Seattle University Law Review

Today’s corporate governance debates are replete with discussion of how best to operationalize so-called stakeholder capitalism—that is, a version of capitalism that considers the interests of employees, communities, suppliers, and the environment alongside (if not before) a company’s shareholders. So much focus has been dedicated to the question of capitalism’s reform that few have questioned a key underlying premise of stakeholder capitalism: that is, that competitive capitalism does not serve these various constituencies and groups. This Essay presents a different view and argues that capitalism is, in fact, the ultimate form of stakeholderism. As such, the Essay urges that the …

The Esg Information System, Stavros Gadinis, Amelia Miazad

Seattle University Law Review

The mounting focus on ESG has forced internal corporate decision-making into the spotlight. Investors are eager to support companies in innovative “green” technologies and scrutinize companies’ transition plans. Activists are targeting boards whose decisions appear too timid or insufficiently explained. Consumers and employees are incorporating companies sustainability credentials in their purchasing and employment decisions. These actors are asking companies for better information, higher quality reports, and granular data. In response, companies are producing lengthy sustainability reports, adopting ambitious purpose statements, and touting their sustainability credentials. Understandably, concerns about greenwashing and accountability abound, and policymakers are preparing for action.

In this …

Table Of Contents, Seattle University Law Review

Seattle University Law Review

Table of Contents

The Marijuana Insurgency: Federalism And Social Reframing In Policy Reform, Matthew P. Cavedon

Seattle University Law Review

After fifty years of federal prohibition, marijuana reform efforts have won political and legal success. These victories hold lessons for anyone seeking to resist federal law without being able to directly affect it.

Victory can come from reframing an issue. For marijuana reform, social reframing—not formal legal analysis or material factors—provides the best explanation for how advocates achieved change. Their unconventional political tactics, akin to those used by insurgents in wartime, undercut federal prohibition by winning hearts and minds.

This is an analysis of the sociology of legal change. It is also the story of how ordinary Americans retook personal …

What Is In Your Tampon? Increasing Transparency In Menstrual Products, Elianna Spitzer

Seattle University Law Review

The average person who menstruates will bleed for an average of five days, every twenty-four to thirty-eight days, over several decades and could use thousands of disposable menstrual products in their lifetime. Menstrual products line retail shelves. They can be found in homes, bags, and bodies—but until 2021, manufacturers were not required to disclose the ingredients used to make these products to consumers at all. In fact, they still are not federally required to disclose menstrual product ingredients on product packaging. Instead, in recent years, changes to menstrual product labels have largely been the result of state legislation. In 2019, …

Shareholder Primacy Versus Shareholder Accountability, William W. Bratton

Seattle University Law Review

When corporations inflict injuries in the course of business, shareholders wielding environmental, social, and governance (“ESG”) principles can, and now sometimes do, intervene to correct the matter. In the emerging fact pattern, corporate social accountability expands out of its historic collectivized frame to become an internal subject matter—a corporate governance topic. As a result, shareholder accountability surfaces as a policy question for the first time. The Big Three index fund managers, BlackRock, Vanguard, and State Street, responded to the accountability question with ESG activism. In so doing, they defected against corporate legal theory’s central tenet, shareholder primacy. Shareholder primacy builds …

Verses Turned To Verdicts: Ysl Rico Case Sets A High-Watermark For The Legal Pseudo-Censorship Of Rap Music, Nabil Yousfi

Seattle University Law Review

Whichever way you spin the record, rap music and courtrooms don’t mix. On one side, rap records are well known for their unapologetic lyrical composition, often expressing a blatant disregard for legal institutions and authorities. On the other, court records reflect a Van Gogh’s ear for rap music, frequently allowing rap lyrics—but not similar lyrics from other genres—to be used as criminal evidence against the defendants who authored them. Over the last thirty years, this immiscibility has engendered a legal landscape where prosecutors wield rap lyrics as potent instruments for criminal prosecution. In such cases, color-blind courts neglect that rap …

We Shall Overcome: The Evolution Of Quotas In The Land Of The Free And The Home Of Samba, Stella Emery Santana

Seattle University Law Review

When were voices given to the voiceless? When will education be permitted to all? When will we need to protest no more? It’s the twenty-first century, and the fight for equity in higher education remains a challenge to peoples all over the world. While students in the United States must deal with the increase in loans, in Brazil, only around 20% of youth between the ages of twenty-five and thirty-four have a higher education degree.

The primary objective of this Article is to conduct an in-depth comparative analysis of the development, implementation, and legal adjudication of educational quota systems within …

Pacific Islands And The U.S. Military: The Legal Borderlands Of The Environmental Movement, Sonia Lei

Seattle University Law Review

Climate change remains an urgent, ongoing global issue that requires critical examination of institutional polluters. This includes the world’s largest institutional consumer of petroleum: the United States military. The Department of Defense (DoD) is a massive institution with little oversight, a carbon footprint spanning the globe, a budget greater than the next ten largest nations combined, and overly generous exemptions to environmental regulations and carbon reduction targets. This Comment examines how this lack of accountability and oversight plays out in the context of three Pacific islands that have hosted U.S. military bases for decades. By considering the environmental impact of …

The Consumer’S Choice To Boycott, Agnes Bresee

Seattle University Law Review

In the wake of employees losing their jobs upon voicing their political opinions concerning Israel, Harvard and Columbia law students’ job offers being rescinded upon expressing support for Palestine, and the names and social media profiles of individuals who support Palestine being collected and listed on Canary Mission, such backlash may leave many Americans wondering what form of resistance to settler-colonialist apartheid is acceptable in the twenty-first century. Recently, the movement to collectively boycott brands like Starbucks, which sued its Worker’s Union for a tweet expressing support for Palestine; Disney, which donated money to Israel; and McDonald’s, where a location …

Table Of Contents, Seattle University Law Review

Seattle University Law Review

Table of Contents

A Different Approach To Agency Theory And Implications For Esg, Jonathan Bonham, Amoray Riggs-Cragun

Seattle University Law Review

In conventional agency theory, the agent is modeled as exerting unobservable “effort” that influences the distribution over outcomes the principal cares about. Recent papers instead allow the agent to choose the entire distribution, an assumption that better describes the extensive and flexible control that CEOs have over firm outcomes. Under this assumption, the optimal contract rewards the agent directly for outcomes the principal cares about, rather than for what those outcomes reveal about the agent’s effort. This article briefly summarizes this new agency model and discusses its implications for contracting on ESG activities.