News & Insights

The “War on Drugs” could better be described as a “War on People.” In addition to obvious negative impacts such as incarceration and increases in drug-related harm, this “War” also leads to collateral consequences that can last for years —or even a lifetime. Collateral consequences are legal barriers resulting from a person’s conviction in addition to incarceration, parole or probation, and fines and fees.

The Network for Public Health Law’s report, Innovative Law and Policy Strategies for a Post-Pandemic Public Health System, which highlights examples of laws and legal levers implemented across the country that strengthen public health, was inspired and shaped in large part by three questions raised by public health practitioners in the field in three different states.

Unlike how they regulate the far more deadly drug products tobacco and alcohol, states overwhelmingly continue to treat individuals who use illicit drugs as criminals, and state law is oriented towards arresting, prosecuting, and incarcerating them. A few states, however, have made more significant changes, and some have made less drastic but still important changes.

The Network is seeking a Program Coordinator to join the team at its Mid-States Region Office to provide operations and program support. This is a fully remote position, with team members located across the country.

Tobacco product waste represents environmentally damaging single-use plastic in the form of cigarette butts and electronic smoking devices. Efforts on a global and national level are underway to address these harms, including interesting examples of novel litter laws from Maine and California to Singapore and Rwanda.

The Network supports the proposed changes to the HIPAA Privacy Rule to bolster privacy of reproductive health information and provide our comments outlining further suggestions and support. Protecting the privacy of reproductive health information is paramount to preventing inequitable enforcement of state laws criminalizing health care access.

Many Americans spend approximately 90 percent of their time indoors where the concentration of pollutants is two to five times higher than outdoors. Existing laws regulating indoor air quality are inconsistent and incomplete. In response a team of scientists, policymakers, and legal drafters is in the process of crafting a Model State Indoor Air Quality Act.

Public health agencies often find access to substance use disorder (SUD) data records especially challenging. Through the CARES Act, Congress harmonizes certain provisions of HIPAA and 42 CFR Part 2 —both of which governs disclosure of SUD records —and requires that HHS continue these efforts through rulemaking.

A notice of proposed changes to the HIPAA Privacy Rule was recently issued to bolster the privacy of protected health information (PHI) relating to reproductive health care. The proposed changes are the latest in a series of steps by the Biden administration addressing privacy of reproductive health information following the Supreme Court's Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision last summer. This post takes a closer look at the proposed changes to HIPAA.

With the end of the COVID-19 Public Health Emergency, reporting of certain data to CDC, and consequently some data analytics and surveillance provided by CDC, will no longer be available after May 11. The impact of these changes means that the public will no longer see certain metrics from CDC, such as color-coded transmission levels and community maps. More broadly, it means a less centralized approach to COVID-19 data collection and reporting to the public and a return to the fragmented public health system where states and localities exercise their own legal authority.

Before becoming a human rights activist, physician and lawyer, and a career that included leadership of projects and programs in over 30 countries, Dr. Gupta had her first advocacy win at age seven. Dr. Gupta shares insights from her remarkable journey in social justice, and how she gained a multifaceted perspective on the interplay between health, equity, social justice, and law and policy.