Health and Public Health Law Articles

Also see: Presentations

These are articles with full text links. For a complete list of Professor Richards publications, see his CV.

Article Series

Engineering and the Law: A Collection of Articles from The IEEE Engineering in Biology and Medicine Journal

Individual Articles

Edward P. Richards, Dangerous People, Unsafe Conditions The Constitutional Basis for Public Health Surveillance. 30 Journal of Legal Medicine 25:50 (2009)

Hilary S. Leeds; Edward P. Richards. Legal Issues in Accommodating the Americans with Disabilities Act to the Diabetic Worker. Journal of Legal Medicine, Volume 29 Issue 3 2008 271–283.

Edward P. Richards, Public Health Law as Administrative Law, 10 Journal of Health Care Law & Policy 61-88 (2007).

Edward P. Richards, 2006-2007 National Health Law Moot Court Competition, 28 J. Legal Med. 437 (2007).

Edward P. Richards, Katharine C. Rathbun, Corina Solé Brito, and Andrea Luna: The Role of Law Enforcement in Public Health Emergencies: Special Considerations for an All-Hazards Approach. DOJ Guide. September 2006

Edward P. Richards, Katharine C. Rathbun, and Jay Alexander Gold, The Smallpox Vaccination Campaign of 2003: Why Did It Fail and What Are the Lessons for Bioterrorism Preparedness?, 64 Louisiana Law Review 851-904 (2005), Bioterrorism Symposia.

Edward P. Richards and Thomas R. McLean, Administrative Compensation for Medical Malpractice Injuries: Reconciling the Brave New World of Patient Safety and the Torts System, 49 St. Louis University Law Journal 73-104 (2005) Health Law Symposium.

Thomas R. McLean and Edward P. Richards, "Health Care's 'Thirty Years War': The Origins and Dissolution of Managed Care," 60 NYU Annual Survey of American Law 283 (2004)

Obesity Legislation: Rushing into the Void - Third Annual CDC Public Health Law Conference, Atlanta, June, 2004 (slides)

Public Health Law as Administrative Law (slides) (hypertext guide) - Third Annual CDC Public Health Law Conference, Atlanta, June, 2004

Richards EP, Rathbun KC. Making state public health laws work for SARS outbreaks. Emerg Infect Dis Feb 2004. Original link: URL: http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/EID/vol10no2/03-0836.htm (Companion CDC article)

Edward P. Richards, "Collaboration between Public Health and Law Enforcement: The Constitutional Challenge," Emerging Infectious Diseases, Vol. 8, No. 10, p.1157-1159 (October 2002)

Edward P. Richards, Terry O'Brien, Katharine C. Rathbun, "Bioterrorism and the Use of Fear in Public Health", 34 THE URBAN LAWYER 686 (2002)

Edward P. Richards, "The Role of Medical and Public Health Services in Sustainable Development", 32 ELR 11299 (2002)

Edward P. Richards, "Public Policy Implications of Liability Regimes for Injuries Caused by Persons with Alzheimer's Disease", 35 Ga L Rev 621 (2001)

Thomas R. McLean, MD, MS, JD, FACS and Edward P. Richards, JD, MPH , "Managed Care Liability for Breach of Fiduciary Duty after Pegram v. Herdrich: The End of ERISA Preemption for State Law Liability for Medical Care Decision Making," 53 University of Florida Law Review 1 (2001)

Edward P. Richards and Katharine C. Rathbun, "The Role of the Police Power in 21st Century Public Health", Journal of Sexually Transmitted Diseases, 1999;26(6):350-7 - this article discusses the constitutional basis of public health orders.

Edward P. Richards, "The Police Power and the Regulation of Medical Practice: A Historical Review and Guide for Medical Licensing Board Regulation of Physicians in ERISA-Qualified Managed Care Organizations", 8 Annals of Health Law 201 (1999)

Edward P Richards, "HIV: Testing, Screening, and Confidentiality - An American Perspective", in Erin, CA and Bennett, R, eds. HIV and AIDS; Testing, Screening, and Confidentiality, Oxford (1999)

Katharine C. Rathbun and Edward P. Richards, Professional Courtesy. Missouri Medicine 1998;95:18-20.

Edward P. Richards, Past as Prolog: Can Managed Care Overcome the Conflicts Inherited from Fee-For-Service Medicine? 66 UMKC L. Rev. 735 (1998).

Katharine C. Rathbun and Edward P. Richards, Supervising RNs and Advance Nurse Practitioners: New Regulations for Missouri. Missouri Medicine 1997;94:17-?.

Fraud Alert for Attorneys Counseling Physicians and Medical Businesses: A short article written in 1991 presaging the problems of counseling clients with fraud and abuse problems.

Physicians and their Profession: Do Racketeering Rules Apply?: An article written in 1989 predicting criminal fraud prosecutions for kickbacks in health care.

This article discusses HIV reporting and contact tracing and how it was used in the first HIV reporting law.

Edward P. Richards, "The Jurisprudence Of Prevention: The Right Of Societal Self-Defense Against Dangerous Persons" - HTML - PDF

This article was written in 1989 to refute the idea that traditional public health laws had been implicitly repealed by the Warren Court.  The thesis is developed through an analysis of then current United State Supreme Court decisions involving the control of dangerous persons, including criminal law decisions.  While the article does not endorse the use of public health law powers in the criminal law context, the Supreme Court's willingness to do so clearly implies that it believes that the traditional public health law decisions are still good precedent.  Kansas v. Hendricks, 521 U.S. 346 (1997), decided well after the publication of this article, follows the rationale of the criminal law cases analyzed in the article and applies traditional public health principles to the detention of sexual predators.

The United States Supreme Court Rules on the Americans With Disabilities Act

The Americans with Disabilities Act has important implications in the management of patients with communicable diseases.  This article reviews the US Supreme Court cases construing the ADA.