[Blogger’s Note: I am very pleased to share this post by my colleague at Seton Hall Law, Carl Coleman. This post was cross-posted at Health Reform Watch.] By Carl H. Coleman With well over 5,000 global deaths from Ebola already reported, drug developers are working fast to begin human clinical trials of promising experimental treatments. Earlier this month,…
By Kelsey Berry Much of the recent Ebola coverage has brought to the forefront principles of disaster triage and served as a reminder of the inescapability of rationing health care resources. A piece in The New Yorker recently highlighted the plight of pregnant women and their apparent exclusion from standard Ebola wards in Sierra Leone. Professor and Ethicist Nir…
By Michelle Meyer The case I mentioned in my last post, Maine Department of Health and Human Services v. Kaci Hickox is no more. Hickox and public health officials agreed to stipulate to a final court order imposing on Hickox the terms that the court had imposed on her in an earlier, temporary order. Until…
Harvard College Effective Altruism presents: The Past, Present, and Future of Violence with Steven Pinker Monday, November 17th, 7 PM Science Center D RSVP here. Contact Harvard College Effective Altruism at harvardea@gmail.com.
Join us for an important public forum: Constitutional Implications of Ebola:Civil Liberties & Civil Rights In Times of Health Crises This public forum addresses the constitutional and public health implications of Ebola response in the United States. According to state and federal laws, patient information is deemed private and is to be held in strict…
By Rachel Sachs The recent arrival of Ebola in the United States has captured the attention of both the public and the media for many reasons. One key reason is that Ebola is making many people realize for the first time that serious diseases which were formerly confined largely to developing countries have the potential to…
By Michelle Meyer [Author’s Note: Addendum and updates (latest: 4 pm, 10/31) added below.] A physician shall… be honest in all professional interactions, and strive to report physicians… engaging in fraud or deception, to appropriate entities.—AMA Principles of Medical Ethics This is a troubling series of news reports about deception and defiance on the part of some…
By David Orentlicher[Cross-posted at Health Law Profs and PrawfsBlawg.] Undoubtedly, the death toll in West Africa would be much lower if Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone had better health care systems or if an Ebola vaccine had been developed already. But as Fran Quigley has observed, Ebola is much more a problem of poverty than of health. Ebola…
By Michele Goodwin As the nation braces for possibly more Ebola cases, civil liberties should be considered, including patient privacy. As news media feature headline-grabbing stories about quarantines, let’s think about the laws governing privacy in healthcare. Despite federal laws enacted to protect patient privacy, the Ebola scare brings the vulnerability of individuals and the…
By David Orentlicher[Cross-posted at Health Law Profs and PrawfsBlawg.] In the wake of Craig Spencer’s decision to go bowling in Brooklyn, governors of three major states—Illinois, New Jersey, and New York—have imposed new Ebola quarantine rules that are inconsistent with national public health policy, are not likely to protect Americans from Ebola, and may compromise the response to Ebola in…
