What should or should not be a law

Understanding the difference between law and policy and the intersections between the two, can be helpful in understanding what kind of career path you would like to take and if additional education such as law school, a Masters in Public Administration, or both are necessary. How are they defined? From this article , they define these terms as:. It also evolves the principles that are needed for achieving the goal.

Policies are only documents and not law, but these policies can lead to new laws. Law is mainly made for implementing justice in the society. There are various types of laws framed like criminal laws, civil laws, and international laws.

In , another act of Congress further clarified the Federal role in quarantine activities. Local quarantine stations were gradually turned over to the government as local authorities came to realize the benefits of Federal involvement. Additional facilities were built to provide better coverage, and quarantine was nationalized. By , all quarantine stations were under Federal control.

In , with codification of the Public Health Service Act, the Federal Government's quarantine authority was clearly established for the first time.

CDC assumed responsibility for Quarantine in Public Health Service responsibility for preventing the introduction, transmission, and spread of communicable diseases from foreign countries into the United States. Under its delegated authority, the Division of Global Migration and Quarantine is empowered to detain, medically examine, or conditionally release individuals and wildlife suspected of carrying a communicable disease.

The list of quarantinable diseases is contained in an Executive Order of the President and includes cholera, diphtheria, infectious tuberculosis, plague, smallpox, yellow fever, and viral hemorrhagic fevers, such as Marburg, Ebola and Congo-Crimean.

The speed of travel among nations, as well as the number of travelers, has accelerated the opportunity for the rapid dissemination of disease from one country or continent to another. In September , India reported cases of plague for the first time in 28 years. During the plague epidemic, crews on all commercial aircraft originating in or continuing from India were reminded of the regulations requiring them to notify the Quarantine Officer as the destination airport of any ill passengers and were instructed to be especially alert for passengers with fever, cough, or chills.

Before disembarking, a quarantine officer and physician examined passengers who reported illness to determine if the illness warranted hospitalization and further evaluation. If deemed not likely to have plague, the passenger was placed under surveillance and released with instructions. If a passenger would have been considered a patient with suspected plague, the passenger would have been placed in isolation a the airport until transport to a predetermined hospital.

At the hospital the passenger would have been placed under respiratory isolation. Other patients on the flight would have been informed that they were under surveillance, according to federal quarantine regulations. Persons identified, by proximity, to the sick passenger, would have been provided antibiotic prophylaxis. For this public health response to work, many agencies contributed at the federal, state, and local levels of public health and the Immigration and Naturalization Service, the U.

Customs Service, commercial airlines, medical practitioners, hospital personnel and the public played key roles. You will need to be familiar with the following definitions and types of quarantine:. Definitions and Processes. These concepts may be critical in the response to suspected or confirmed large-scale terrorist events. Questions about both persons who have active cases of illness and those who may be incubating the disease and infectious would have to be considered to protect non-exposed well persons.

The public health response, timing, and degree of the response, would depend on the following aspects of the outbreak:. For individuals who are sick, the appropriate response may be isolation home or congregate settings and respiratory isolation. Sick persons would need to be monitored to detect new cases and monitor disease treatment.

For individuals who were or may have been exposed but not exhibiting symptoms of illness, the appropriate response may be quarantine, isolation, and or surveillance to detect the disease and provide appropriate treatment to help prevent the onset of illness such as a drug prescription.

At the community level, the response could follow four levels of activity. Recently, CDC researchers constructed a mathematical model to describe the spread of smallpox after a deliberate release of the virus. The model demonstrated, based on the assumption of people being initially infected and three people infected per infectious person, that it is theoretically possible to completely halt the spread of smallpox by quarantine only.

The researcher noted that the level of quarantine needed and the speed at which public acceptance of the quarantine had to be achieved that it may prove impossible to enforce. The researchers concluded that a combination of both vaccination and quarantine worked best, but still approximately 4, cases would occur and it would take a year to stop the outbreak.

The researchers noted that to successfully enforce quarantine, requires political will, public acceptance, and group discipline. Interstate quarantine. Public health law allows that whenever the Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention determines that the measures taken by health authorities of any State or possession are insufficient to prevent the spread of any of the communicable diseases from one State to another State or possession, the director may take measures to prevent spread of the diseases.

Measures may include inspection, fumigation, disinfection, sanitation, pest extermination, and destruction of animals or articles believed to be sources of infection. In addition, a person who has a communicable disease in the communicable period can be restricted from traveling from one State or possession to another without a permit from the health officer of the State, possession, or locality of destination.

The person in charge of any conveyance e. Certain communicable diseases invoke special requirements. The following provisions are applicable with respect to any person who is in the communicable period of cholera, plague, smallpox, typhus, or yellow fever, or who, having been exposed to any such disease, is in the incubation period.

Without a written permit of the Surgeon General or authorized representative, the person cannot travel from one State or possession to another or on a conveyance engaged in interstate traffic. Persons given written permission will be required to present the permit to operators of the conveyances.

Apprehension and detention of persons with specific diseases for the purpose of preventing the introduction, transmission, or spread of the following diseases: anthrax, chancroid, cholera, dengue, diphtheria, granuloma inguinale, infectious encephalitis, favus, gonorrhea, leprosy, lymphogranuloma venereum, meningococcus meningitis, plague, poliomyelitis, psittacosis, relapsing fever, ringworm of the scalp, scarlet fever, streptococcic sore throat, smallpox, syphilis, trachoma, tuberculosis, typhoid fever, typhus, and yellow fever.

A parent, guardian, physician, nurse, or other such person should not transport, procure, or furnish transportation for any minor child or ward, patient, or other such person who is in the communicable period of a communicable disease, except in accordance with regulatory provisions. Separate provisions exist for military personnel. Foreign quarantine. For ships destined for a U. The commander of an aircraft destined for a U. All cases of diarrhea that occur after the hour report must also be reported not less than four hours before arrival.

The director of CDC may require detention of a carrier until the completion of the measures necessary to prevent the introduction or spread of a communicable disease. The director may issue a controlled-free pratique to the carrier stipulating measures to be met, but such issuance does not prevent the periodic boarding of a carrier and the inspection of persons and records to verify that the conditions have been met for granting the pratique.

Persons, carriers, and things. Whenever the director of CDC has reason to believe that any arriving person is infected with or has been exposed to any of the following communicable diseases, the director may detain, isolate, or place the person under surveillance and may order disinfection or disinfestation as he or she considers necessary to prevent their introduction, transmission, or spread: cholera or suspected cholera, diphtheria, infectious tuberculosis, plague, suspected smallpox, yellow fever, or suspected viral hemorrhagic fevers e.

Whenever the director has reason to believe that any arriving carrier or article on board the carrier is or may be infected or contaminated with a communicable disease, he or she may require detention, disinfection, disinfestation, fumigation, or other related measures as he or she considers necessary to prevent the introduction, transmission, or spread of communicable diseases. Persons: Isolation and Surveillance.

The director of CDC may require the isolation of a person where surveillance is authorized whenever the director considers the risk of transmission of infection to be exceptionally serious. State Tort Claims Acts. Because of the inherent unfairness of absolute sovereign and governmental immunity, which forced injured parties to bear the costs of an accident, virtually all States have repealed these sweeping common law principles, replacing them with more limited immunities through State legislation known as State tort claims acts and, in some States, by State constitutional provision.

What remains, at least in some jurisdictions, is that the law continues to distinguish between the State and its political subdivisions when conferring immunities.

Similarly, in some jurisdictions the language and rationale provided in the common law distinguishing between proprietary and governmental functions persist to this day. You should become familiar with the following forms of liability:. Liability of States and their political subdivisions. In most if not all States and localities, government officials are, by statute, granted immunity from lawsuits arising from the exercise of their governmental functions.

Most may be held liable for torts arising from the exercise of proprietary functions. State laws generally take one of two forms:.

The rules for governmental tort immunities of counties and municipal corporations usually take one of three forms, the first of which is the most common. Regardless of the form they take, virtually all State tort claims acts:. The term "negligence" means a failure to exercise reasonable care and caution. The standard by which the legal system judges "reasonable care" is often expressed as that which a "prudent" or careful person would do.

Liability for proprietary functions. Public health agencies are often involved in the provision of clinical services through public health clinics, school health programs, and the like.

In such situations, the public health clinician has a legal responsibility to provide care that meets the same high professional standards expected of private clinicians. Failure to perform at this level of care and competency constitutes malpractice, that is, negligent performance by a professional that results in harm to the patient or client. International students Continuing education Executive and professional education Courses in education. Research at Cambridge. Faculty Officers.

University Teaching Officers in the Institute of Criminology. Affiliated Lecturers. Retired and honorary members. Research Staff. Research Students. Development and Communications.

The fact that the Rule of Law is intrinsic to our society is demonstrated by the discomfort we feel when confronted with legal systems which operate without the Rule of Law, as with the examples noted at the start of this article.

Duplessis , , meaning that the Rule of Law forms part of the supreme law of our country, binding on all levels of government and enforceable by the courts. Apart from the fact that our constitution expressly recognizes or refers to the Rule of Law, the Supreme Court of Canada has also suggested that the very existence of our constitution implicitly demonstrates our respect for the Rule of Law because a constitution is by nature intended to be a supreme, objective law which describes the expected social order and which both governments and citizens must follow.

The founders of this nation must have intended, as one of the basic principles of nation building, that Canada be a society of legal order and normative structure: one governed by rule of law. While this is not set out in a specific provision, the principle of the rule of law is clearly a principle of our Constitution. On the contrary, like all other legal principles, the Rule of Law is sometimes violated—either intentionally or unintentionally, directly or indirectly, and in a myriad of different ways.

So, while we can and should take for granted the important role that the Rule of Law plays in our society, we cannot and should not necessarily assume that the Rule of Law will always be followed by our law-makers.

As with all other legal principles, we have to look to the courts to ensure that the Rule of Law is enforced. To date, Canadian courts have played a very active role in maintaining and enforcing the Rule of Law. The courts have referred to, defined, and applied the Rule of Law in many cases.

Duplessis and the Reference re Secession of the Province of Quebec. Although these decisions were made years apart, both cases demonstrate the importance which Canadian courts place on the Rule of Law and the essential service the courts provide in ensuring that our law-makers respect this Rule. In Roncarelli v. In essence, Premier Duplessis was trying to indirectly discourage Roncarelli from posting bail for his friends.

The liquor licence could only properly be revoked if the cancellation was authorized by a particular statute or law. The Quebec statute which dealt with liquor licensing gave the power to issue or cancel liquor licences exclusively to another Quebec official and not to the Premier.

In Reference re Secession of Quebec , the Canadian government asked the Supreme Court of Canada to provide an opinion on the right of Quebec to unilaterally secede from Canada. This issue arose because of the stated intention of the Quebec government to declare Quebec to be an independent nation, regardless of any objection by the other Canadian provinces or the federal government, if Quebec citizens voted in favour of independence in a provincial referendum.