Public Health Law and Regulation

Public Health Law and Regulation critically evaluates the interaction between law and public health, asking how law and regulation support best practice in public health. The book explains the legal and regulatory regimes established to achieve public health objectives, providing detailed analysis in the areas of sanitation, food, drugs, and communicable disease. It also explains and analyses key approaches and issues, such as: a coherent "risk based" approach to public health law; the interface between laws protecting the environment and laws protecting human health; the role of regulation in obtaining compliance; the application of a "public health approach" to legislation; responses to emerging public health threats, particularly non-communicable diseases caused by 21st-century lifestyles. Importantly, Public Health Law and Regulation anticipates future issues, including new and incurable epidemics and deliberate infection through bioterrorism.