Law & Policy Insights

As food allergies become more prevalent, there is increased risk of harm from serious and life-threatening reactions. However, this risk is frequently overlooked or disregarded by the food service industry. While federal law requires the packaged food industry to label any major allergens in their products, there is no mandate that restaurants do so. In response, several states have enacted legislation requiring food-service establishments to take additional food allergen precautions.

As more states legalize medical and recreational marijuana use, they are being confronted with a broad spectrum of policy issues. One of the emerging issues is whether to allow the legal cannabis industry to deliver marijuana directly to customers. Advocates see it as an issue of access, especially for medical marijuana patients. Opponents argue that delivery will make it easier for kids to get marijuana and that the delivery vehicles will be targeted by criminals.

Trees are beautiful, but are they also a cure for climate change related health hazards? We know that trees beautify urban spaces, increase property values, reduce stress, improve mental health, and benefit communities by reducing crime rates and increasing social cohesion. But tree cover can also provide significant cooling benefits to offset dangerous temperatures during extreme heat events, which are on the rise in urban areas as a result of climate change.

Overdose “Good Samaritan” laws are theoretically designed to encourage people to call for help in an overdose emergency by providing limited legal immunity to overdose victims and those who seek help for them, but many of these laws currently have limitations that discourage people from seeking help.

Healthy soil contains organic matter that contributes to the nutritional quality of food and can have a significant impact on agricultural output. It also plays a critical role in mitigating the effects of climate change by reducing erosion and storm water runoff, protecting against drought, and reducing carbon emissions. Policymakers at both the federal and local level are increasingly including laws and provisions that promote healthy soils in their environmental policies and legislation.

Public health leaders have criticized a recent U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) proposal that would place an increased burden on those seeking to prove discrimination in housing practices. While the HUD proposal moves through the regulatory process, another federal agency, the Department of Justice, continues to do its part to prevent discrimination in housing and punish those who engage in unfair and illegal housing practices.

In 2019, several states passed strict laws limiting access to abortion. Some state laws specifically aim to overturn the seminal case, Roe v. Wade. Proposed legislation modeled after the Voting Rights Act seeks to require states with a history of restricting access to abortion to preclear any new abortion law with the Department of Justice before such law or practice can take effect.

The medium through which an environmental exposure occurs (e.g., water, air, soil) is often geographically based and/or clustered. For this reason, responding to an environmental health threat in a meaningful and timely way requires real-time, granular data and prompt local action. The broad range of potentially relevant environmental health data sources highlights one of the key legal challenges with obtaining and using local data: often each type of data (hazard, exposure and health outcome) is governed by a different law and may be collected by a different entity.

Public health law and policy stories that made headlines recently include expanding Medicaid access post-postpartum to improve maternal mortality rates; how changes in naloxone access laws could save thousands of lives; Juul’s suspension of flavored e-cigarette product sales amid growing scrutiny of its advertising practices; how proposed food-stamp cutbacks could worsen obesity and food insecurity in the U.S.; and a landmark ruling on supervised injection sites.

Syringe service programs (SSP) are places where people who inject drugs (PWID) can receive new syringes and other injection equipment and drop off used supplies. They typically also provide other harm reduction and health promotion services including referrals to treatment, hepatitis C and HIV testing, the overdose reversal medication naloxone, and other related services. Nevertheless, SSPs are controversial due to stigma around PWID and many states prohibit the use of state funds for the operation of SSPs.