Assessing Impacts of "Anti-Equity" Legislation on Health Care and Public Health Services.

A deluge of state "anti-equity" legislative bills seek to reverse prevailing trends in diversity, equity, and inclusion; withdraw protections of LGBTQ+ communities; and deny access to gender-based care for trans minors and adults. While the political and constitutional fate of these acts is undetermined, profound impacts on patients and their providers are already affecting the delivery of health care and public health services.

Supreme Court Impacts in Public Health Law: 2022-2023.

In another tumultuous term of the United States Supreme Court in 2022-2023 a series of critical cases implicate instant and forthcoming changes in multiple fronts that collectively shift the national public health law and policy environment.

The Model State Indoor Air Quality Act.

This Viewpoint discusses how poor indoor air quality can affect health and examines the Model State Indoor Air Quality Act, which provides science-based regulatory standards aimed at ensuring public indoor environments provide healthy air.

"Out Like a Lion:" Terminating the COVID-19 National Public Health Emergency.

From its inception, the COVID-19 pandemic has been a disruptive force on U.S. health care and public health systems. President Biden's announced termination of the national public health emergency on May 11, 2023 portends a return to normalcy and relief for Americans from the greatest infectious disease scourge the nation has ever faced. In reality, closing out this pandemic presents a tempest of legal and practical complications.

Medicare's Historic Prescription Drug Price Negotiations.

This Viewpoint evaluates the legal claims and policy implications of historic drug price negotiations possible with the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022.

Midterm Maelstrom: Public Health Legal Impacts of Election 2022.

Among the morass of critical issues impacting the results of the midterm elections in 2022 were core public health issues related to health care access, justice, and reforms. Collectively, voters' communal health and safety concerns dominated outcomes in key races which may shape national, state, and local legal approaches to protecting the public's health in the modern era.

Medicare Drug Pricing Negotiations: Assessing Constitutional Structural Limits.

A series of structural constitutional arguments lodged in multiple cases against Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services' (CMS) authorities to negotiate prescription drug prices via the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act threaten the legitimacy of CMS program and federal agency powers.

Supreme Court Impacts in Public Health Law: 2021-2022.

In a dynamic term of the United States Supreme Court in 2021-2022 a series of critical cases raise manifold changes and impacts on individual and communal health through 10 key areas ranging from abortions to vaccinations.

Regressive Federalism, Rights Reversals, and the Public's Health.

As the United States emerges from the worst public health threat it has ever experienced, the Supreme Court is poised to reconsider constitutional principles from bygone eras. Judicial proposals to roll back rights under a federalism infrastructure grounded in states' interests threaten the nation's legal fabric at a precarious time. This column explores judicial shifts in 3 key public health contexts - reproductive rights, vaccinations, and national security - and their repercussions.

Reminiscences on Public Health Law and JLME.

This contribution marks a dual milestone at the intersection of public health law and JLME: my 50th publication of a substantive manuscript in the 50th anniversary of the Journal in 2022. In recognition of these coinciding landmarks, this installment of the Public Health Law column for JLME features observations and reflections of the field based largely on prior publications.

Designing COVID-19 vaccine mandates in colleges and universities: a roadmap to the 10 key questions.

COVID-19 transmission among students, faculty, and staff at US institutions of higher education (IHEs) is a pressing concern, especially with the dominance of the highly contagious Delta variant and emergence of the Omicron variant. From the start of the pandemic to May 26, 2021, >700,000 cases were linked to US colleges and universities. To protect their populations and surrounding communities, IHE administrators are increasingly considering COVID-19 vaccine requirements. Roughly one-quarter of the nearly 4,000 college and university campuses across the US have announced COVID-19 vaccine mandates for students or employees. However, deciding to require vaccination is only the first of multiple decisions, as IHEs face complex issues of how to design and refine their mandates, including whether to require boosters. Mandates vary significantly in stringency, implementation, impact on members of the college or university community, and net benefit to the institution. This essay examines 10 key questions that an IHE must face in designing or refining a COVID-19 vaccination mandate. Showing that these 10 questions were carefully considered may be crucial if the institution's mandate is challenged. Ultimately, how an IHE designs its mandate may make the difference between meaningful risk mitigation that advances institutional goals and benefits students, faculty, and staff versus a public health failure that erodes trust, raises equity concerns, threatens to undermine preexisting vaccination requirements, and divides the campus.

Federalism's Fallacy at the Forefront of Public Health Law.

Amid undulating conceptions of the role and prowess of federalism emerges its central constitutional role: protecting American liberties against unwarranted governmental intrusions. To the extent that federalism is used as a guise for withdrawing fundamental rights to abortion by the U.S. Supreme Court in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, individual rights are sacrificed in contravention of constitutional structural norms.

Nationalizing Public Health Emergency Legal Responses.

The fight for public health primacy in U.S. emergency preparedness and response to COVID-19 centers on which level of government - federal or state - should "call the shots" to quell national emergencies?

Legal Challenges Underlying COVID-19 Vaccinations.

Immunizing hundreds of millions against COVID- 19 through the most extensive national vaccine campaign ever undertaken in the United States has generated significant law and policy challenges.

Ethical Allocation of Scarce Food Resources During Public Health Emergencies.

Escalating demands for limited food supplies at America's food banks and pantries during the COVID-19 pandemic have raised ethical concerns underlying "first-come, first-served" distributions strategies. A series of model ethical principles are designed to guide ethical allocations of these resources to assure greater access among persons facing food insecurity.

Saving Lives Now From Ebola in Africa.

In his letter, Peace is a better focus than Ebola in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), David M. Brett-Major provides a vital reminder of the tragic undercurrent of violence and political instability dominating African regions currently impacted by the second worst Ebola outbreak in modern history. He characterizes health-centric activities as a "common mistake" to remedy the "vicious cycle" of endemic violence and disease outbreaks in DRC and surrounding areas. What is truly needed is a "concerted peace and development process, with health as a voice in a chorus - not alone."