This report was prepared for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Public Health Law Program to summarize the research and results undertaken in the first year of a project intended to advance the understanding and practice of legal epidemiology at CDC and state, local and tribal health agencies, with special focus on policy surveillance.
This study explores 24 legislative options in five categories currently being used by states. The paper also offers evidence-based suggestions within each category for how to impact the strength of the vaccination requirement and the number of exemptions.
This map explores the variation in short-term emergency civil commitment laws -- laws that govern how and when an individual may be admitted to a psychiatric facility without their consent.
Section 287(g) of the Immigration and Nationality Act allowed states and localities to enforce federal immigration laws. This study finds that the state-level enforcement of this law has had an adverse impact on the use of pregnancy and childcare-related health services by Hispanic and Latina women.
Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health
Chronic pain is one of the most common reasons for seeking medical attention in the United States, and such pain is frequently treated with prescription opioids.
Tracking of infectious diseases is a public health core function essential to disease prevention and control. Each state mandates reporting of certain infectious diseases to public health authorities. These laws vary by state, and the variation could affect the ability to collect critical information.
The 2009 H1N1 influenza pandemic served as a case study to examine the legal authority in the 50 states; Washington, DC; and New York City for mandatory infectious disease reporting, particularly for influenza and new or emerging infectious diseases.
This dataset explores currently effective recreational marijuana laws, identifying which state agency regulates recreational marijuana, sale and possession restrictions, what tax rates are applied, licensing for retailers and cultivators, and other issues surrounding recreational marijuana.
New Jersey (NJ) implemented the first Graduated Driver Licensing (GDL) decal provision in the U.S. in May 2010. An initial study reported a 1-year post-decal decrease in the crash rate among NJ intermediate drivers aged <21 years. Longer-term analysis is critical for policymakers in other states considering whether to implement a decal provision. This study, published in the American Journal of Public Health, evaluates the longer-term (2-year) effect of NJ’s decal provision on overall and age-specific crash rates of young drivers with intermediate licenses.
A study released in the American Journal of Public Health finds that young men in New York City who report they’ve been stopped and questioned by police are also reporting higher levels of trauma and stress associated with those experiences, particularly when they report that the encounters were intrusive.
