By Jacqueline Jefferson Today it seems impossible for drivers to keep both hands on the steering wheel and eyes on the road, with all the technology that is available to us, temptation is at its best. Somewhere along the road our eyes look down at a text message or our hands wander to program the…
By Scott Burris The rising public and legislative awareness of opioid overdose has been a case study in the twists and turns of culture, risk perception and the role of evidence in policy making. An interesting case study, which does not mean I understand what happened or why. I first got involved in overdose through…
By Scott Burris Christopher Robertson recently posted here a semi-facetious suggestion of things that Democrats could ask for once the shut-down and the debt-ceiling dance turns into real bargaining. (How sad that this has to be seen as an optimistic statement.) That’s a good idea. I think we should all join in populating the health policy…
By Scott Burris Last week, the American Journal of Public Health published a PHLR paper by Michelle Mello and colleagues calling for our field to identfy “critical opportunities” for public health law. Critical Opportunities are legal interventions that target important public health problems. They may have a strong evidence base but be underutilized (like alcohol…
By Scott Burris A new documentary from the HIV Justice Network gets the views of researchers on the impact of HIV criminalization. Call it Evidencer-Based film-making. It premiered last night at the US Conference on HIV and can be seen here. made by Edwin Bernard and Nick Feustel, it captures the issues and what we…
By Scott Burris I am not disputing the value of properly trained health professionals acting as gate-keepers to potentially dangerous drugs. And I am not taking on here the question of which health care professionals should be allowed to prescribe which drugs, though that is an important question on which the states vary quite a…
By Scott Burris The Global Commission on HIV and the Law recently conducted a web discussion of steps to implement the Commission’s recommendations for better harmonizing law and HIV control. One of the questions for discussion was: What are examples of innovative or non-traditional partnerships that can be used to strategically advance human-rights based responses…
By Scott Burris In documenting how often public health law research does influence legislation, I’ve used syringe exchange programs as an example of evidence NOT guiding policy. Despite the consensus in health research that increasing access to sterile syringes has helped reduce HIV, state drug paraphernalia laws, and pharmacy regulations remain a barrier, as does…
By Kathleen West As the world watched Prince William place the new royal baby, reluctantly snug in his car seat, into a vehicle a few weeks ago, my thoughts were not limited to, “Oh, how cute!” After two months researching and collecting a dataset to capture the U.S. laws and regulations for child passenger restraint…
By Scott Burris Over the weekend, my social science friends were all emailing about Nicholas Christakis’ op ed about how we should “shake up the social sciences.” On one level, the piece is easy to mock. Christakis makes a big deal out of the contrast between the academic organization of the natural and social sciences:…
