About the CSTE Public Health Law Repository

About the CSTE Public Health Law Repository  

The Public Health Law Repository aims to provide CSTE members access to self-education resources related to public health authority to better understand the existing legal landscape of public health authority and resources for policy planning purposes.  Public health authority is defined as the legal ability of a government entity to protect and promote the public’s health and provide health communities for all.  The specific health powers available to government entities (such as health departments, governors, community health boards, or health officers) vary based on the laws of that jurisdiction. Broadly, under the Tenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, states have primary power over public health and can share these powers with local government. In other words, state and local health departments and their officials or governing boards are the governmental entities whose legal authorities drive actions that most impact the public’s health. 

Because states have primary power over public health, including the ability to share powers with local government, the initial repository content consists primarily of existing resources related to state public health authority.1 

1. Tribal Nations are also sovereign self-governing entities that possess public health powers. Each of the U.S. territories and freely associated states (FAS) have unique public health powers as well. The federal government’s public health powers are limited to taxation, spending, and regulating interstate commerce. Tribal, territorial, FAS, and federal public health authorities are not the focus of initial repository content.

How To Use This Repository 

This repository is intended to contain resources that members can search through to educate themselves on public health authority broadly and find more information on trends and legislation related to public health authority at the state level. Potential scenarios you might use the repository for include: 

  • Preparing testimony for a policy proposal in your state that limits public health authority 
  • Determining the landscape for communicable disease reporting in a state and a sample of comparator states 
  • Searching for state legislation that creates greater legislative oversight over emergency orders 

To make the repository easier to navigate, we have created a tagging system for individual resources, and 4 overall categories of resources. Tags include references to specific states and legal concepts mentioned in a resource, and other topics of interest contained in the resource. Resources within the repository fall into four categories: 

  1. Public Health Authority and Legal Primers: Resources that broadly explain public health authority and related legal concepts 
  2. Communications and Messaging: Resources that provide guidance on structuring communications to various audiences 
  3. Tracking Databases: Resources that strictly include state-level trackers of legislation, bills, and other legal and policy changes 
  4. Tracking Findings and Trends: Resources that provide analysis and describe trends based on state-level findings 

Sources 

During the COVID-19 pandemic, intense political backlash to mitigation measures sparked increased attempts to curtail public health powers. In 2021, several public health law organizations—the Center for Public Health Law Research, ChangeLab Solutions, the Network for Public Health Law, Public Health Law Center, and Public Health Law Watch—created a national project, Act for Public Health (A4PH), that supports health departments and advocates navigating changes to public health authority. Several other organizations, including the Local Solutions Support Center, American Heart Association, American Public Health Association (APHA), and Association of State and Territorial Health Officials, also have ongoing projects related to public health authority. Much of the public health law repository content includes resources from many of these organizations, drawing primarily from resources developed through A4PH or A4PH partner organizations and the APHA’s Protecting Public Health Authority & Advocacy Toolkit (APHA Toolkit). 

Acknowledgements:  

This project is supported by Cooperative Agreement number NU38OT000297 from The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and CSTE and does not necessarily represent the views of CDC and CSTE. 

In recognition of the need to build cross-jurisdictional consensus on the scope of the public health law repository, the CSTE Public Health Law Repository Workgroup was created in partnership with the Center for Disease Control and Preventions (CDC) Public Health Law Program and the Network for Public Health Law (NPHL).  The Public Health Law Repository Workgroup consisted of CSTE members including public health attorneys, state epidemiologists, and health information technology lead, who dedicated their time and provided their expertise to help with the development of the public health law repository. CSTE thanks you for your contributions!