This page, which was active from August 2020 – May 2021, is no longer being updated, though the posts are archived here for posterity. The COVID and the Law blog has migrated to Bill of Health, the blog of the Petrie-Flom Center for Health Law Policy, Biotechnology, and Bioethics at Harvard Law School, where it continues to publish.
Edited by Jeremy Dang, Taylor Dodson, and Bridgette Slater
The opinions expressed in each unit, blog post, and other materials linked herein represent only the views of the speaker or author. They do not necessarily reflect the views of Harvard Law School or Harvard University.
NO INFORMATION INCLUDED IN THE VIDEO OR ON THE BLOG CAN BE TAKEN AS LEGAL ADVICE.
The Mental Health Impact of COVID-19 on America’s Young Adults: “College seems like a really far away concept right now.”[1]
Mental Health Repercussions of Virtual Interactions and Quarantine The COVID-19 pandemic has upended nearly every aspect of everyday life, canceling …
COVID-19 Containment or Callous Political Ploy? Reflections on Trump’s Pandemic-Era Restrictions on Immigration, Green Cards, and Asylum Claims
The COVID-19 pandemic has upended nearly every aspect of American life, but one facet of federal policy that may appear …
Questions of Life or Death: America’s Underinsurance Crisis in the Age of COVID-19
With COVID-related lockdowns and pandemic safety precautions now past their first anniversary, there is, at long last, hope on the …
Mask Madness: When Freedom of Speech and Opinion Becomes Assaultive
On January 20—the day he was sworn in to office—President Biden signed an executive order mandating masks for federal employees, …
Criminal Jury Trials by Zoom: An Uneasy Bargain with the Constitution
On August 11, 2020, Travis County, Texas made history by holding the nation’s first virtual criminal jury trial. While the …
Access to Abortion in the Era of COVID-19
Limited Access to Elective Medical Procedures During the COVID-19 Pandemic As the coronavirus ravaged the United States, governors nationwide sprang …
Coronavirus surcharges: A lifeboat for small businesses or an underhanded form of price gouging?
The American economy has suffered trillions of dollars in damages since the coronavirus landed on our shores over a year …
COVID-19 and Baseball
The combined effects of the coronavirus and government-imposed shutdowns have cost the US economy an enormous amount of money—perhaps trillions …
Coronavirus and the Right to a Speedy Trial
What does it mean for an individual to have a meaningful right to a speedy trial when the whole world …
University Lawsuits
It’s now been more than a year since most students across the United States started a wild experiment with remote …
Coronavirus and the Takings Clause: An Uneasy Coupling
It’s been more than a year since the first Covid-19 cases were identified, and almost as long since much of …
Vaccine hopes collide with vaccine denial
Americans have been able to feel a little more hopeful recently as vaccines begin to roll out across the country …
Educators, ELLs, and Covid-19
Longstanding obligations meet new challenges In 1974, the Supreme Court held in Lau v. Nichols that the San Francisco school …
Vaccine Requirements, Passports, and the “New Normal”
As vaccination programs slowly ramp up across the United States, a burgeoning idea has slowly gained more traction: immunity “passports” …
Vaccines are here, but not for everyone
The race to vaccinate the world against Covid-19 is on. Though Americans may be lamenting that they have to wait …
COVID-19 in a Federal System: Challenges and Opportunities
Federalism sits at the very core of American government. Yet, the coronavirus pandemic has pushed federalism under the microscope, exposing …
Mask Mandates, Unmasked
On his first day in office, President Biden instituted a mask mandate for airports, on many forms of transportation, and …
Homelessness and COVID: Compounding challenges and restricted relief
COVID-19 has illuminated some of the unique public health and legal challenges facing currently homeless individuals. Particularly as COVID-19 worsened …
Elderly Plaintiffs Caught in the Fray of PREP Act Immunity
As of February 2, 2021, over one-third of U.S. COVID-19 deaths and five-percent of all U.S. COVID-19 cases are linked …
The Rights of Public School Teachers in a Pandemic
With the Biden administration pushing schools to reopen in-person, it is necessary to reflect on the hardships our educators have …
Preparing for the Post-Pandemic Economy
The end of the COVID-19 pandemic may be in sight, but how do we prepare for a new economic environment …
Getting our Child Co-Workers Back to School Safely—and Avoiding the “Education Contracts of Adhesion” Trap
As more private and public primary and secondary (K-12) schools move to reopen in-person, we need to ensure reopening plans …
Journalism During the COVID-19 Pandemic and Beyond
“When I announced it, you all said, ‘It’s not possible.’ Come on, give me a break, man. It’s a good …
Government Information Dissemination in the Post-Trump Era
On Wednesday, January 20, 2021, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki led the Biden administration’s first press briefing. Though no …
Maintaining Child Welfare During COVID-19
When the pandemic began, states across the U.S. witnessed between a twenty to seventy percent decline in reported cases of …
Antitrust: A Barrier or Catalyst to the Vaccine Rollout?
In December 2020, health officials administered the first COVID-19 vaccine and President-Elect Biden promised to deliver more than 100 million …
How to Launch a Digital Contact Tracing Application: Key Legal Considerations
As previously suggested in Digital Contact Tracing: Hope or Hype?, digital contact tracing, if implemented successfully, can help to control …
Staying-at-Home When the Home is Unsafe: The Impact of COVID-19 on Survivors of Domestic Violence (Part 2)
This is the second part of a two-part series about the impact of COVID-19 on survivors of domestic violence. Part …
Staying-at-Home When the Home is Unsafe: The Impact of COVID-19 on Survivors of Domestic Violence (Part 1)
While stay-at-home orders are meant to protect Americans, they can also prove deadly for those facing domestic violence. Under these …
“Stick to the Science”? FDA, Ethics, and Pandemics
Throughout the current pandemic, Dr. Anthony Fauci and other public health experts have called on the government to “stick to …
Farmworker Protection during COVID-19: Will New Jersey learn its lesson?
New Jersey was hit particularly hard by COVID-19 in spring of 2020. There were several factors contributing to its high …
The Long-Term Problem of Eviction Moratoria Without Financial Support
The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated preexisting vulnerabilities in the rental housing market and created a dire economic situation for both …
Government Authority to Respond to COVID-19, the Nondelegation Doctrine, and Legislatures vs. Governors
The most common response to the pandemic has been quick and decisive action from state governors to reduce the spread …
Wait Your Turn: How the Government Can Prevent Individuals from Using Wealth to Cut the Vaccine Line
Since the Food & Drug Administration granted emergency use authorization for the COVID-19 vaccines produced by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna in …
Expanding the Franchise: Constitutional Mechanisms to Make Election Administration Reforms in Response to the COVID-19 Pandemic Permanent
By many measures, the 2020 general election for federal, state, and local positions was a success in terms of an …
From 9/11 to COVID-19: A Brief History of FDA Emergency Use Authorization
The ongoing fight against COVID-19 has thrown a spotlight on the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and its power to …
Federal, State, and Local Responses to Student Absenteeism during COVID-19
In the past several years, school attendance and absenteeism have been key focus areas of education policy. Consistent school attendance …
All Rise, All Mute: Online court proceedings, coronavirus, and access to justice
“[O]ur system of courts is archaic and our procedure behind the times.” – Roscoe Pound (Former Dean of Harvard Law …
Protecting Workers During the COVID-19 Pandemic
The absence of a cohesive federal strategy during the pandemic has allowed many businesses to continue operating without standard safety …
Unprecedented Expulsion of Immigrants at the Southern Border: The Title 42 Process
In March, President Trump relied on a little-used public health rule to drastically restrict immigration at the United States’ land …
Interview with Glenn Cohen
Now that Pfizer and Moderna have begun distributing their COVID-19 vaccines to hospitals across the U.S., a new question has …
The Education Divide Caused by COVID-19
The United States has entered a ‘third’ wave of Covid-19 , and many students are entering yet another month of online …
COVID-19 and Undocumented Workers: A Catastrophic Confluence
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to devastate workers and families across the United States, undocumented immigrants remain particularly vulnerable. Most …
Protecting Public Health Will Require a Culture Shift Alongside Legal Change
Dr. Anthony Fauci has noted that Australia had the fewest number of flu cases “in memory” during its winter flu …
Telework for Caregivers: A Gap in Employment and Disability Law
The pandemic has exposed a gap in our employment and disability laws—a lack of care for caregivers. The workforce is …
Stay-at-Home Orders and Religious Freedom: How Courts Balance the Free Exercise Clause and State Emergency Powers
In the wake of the initial impact of COVID-19, state governments rushed to respond to breakouts. The resulting executive orders …
The Constitutionality of Technology-Assisted Contact Tracing
The COVID-19 pandemic has posed an impossible set of choices for governments, forcing them to weigh the competing interests of …
Decarceration and the Coronavirus Pandemic
At the start of the coronavirus pandemic, many hoped and expected that the pandemic would serve as a natural catalyst …
Contracts in the Age of COVID-19: A Look At Force Majeure Clauses
As businesses continue to confront the harsh economic realities of the ongoing Coronavirus pandemic, many are looking for legal solutions …
COVID-19 and the FDA Emergency Use Authorization Power
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is responsible for protecting public health by regulating the production, distribution, and consumption of …
Police Should Not Be Enforcing Emergency Public Health Orders
On a weekend when police officers were handing masks to white residents in parks around New York City, NYPD Officer …
Travel Restrictions During Coronavirus
Why is traveling during COVID-19 a problem? Whether by airplane, bus, train, or car, traveling increases a person’s chances of …
Coronavirus and the Class Action
As coronavirus has upended life across the globe, the disruption has been followed by a wave of class action cases …
Election Litigation in the Era of COVID-19
The 2020 Presidential election promises to be unlike any in history. The country is still in the midst of a …
A Critical Analysis of the International Response to COVID-19: Reflections from Colombia
In the face of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, questions of resource allocation, information access, aseptisation, and biopolitics that were once reserved …
COVID-19 in Rural America and the Indian Nations: Refocusing Development to Support At-Risk Communities
For many, the COVID-19 pandemic is likely to conjure scenes of once-bustling urban centers grinding to a halt. However, for …
Pandemic Property: What Covid-19 Taught Us about Housing Law
The Covid-19 pandemic has brought to light longstanding problems in housing law. This sudden emergency has exposed systemic deficiencies in …
Digital Contact Tracing: Hope or Hype?
In prior pandemics, manual contact tracing has been key to slow the spread. Contact tracing entails conducting interviews with infected …
Emergency Measures: Free Speech and Online Content Moderation During Coronavirus
A Conversation with HLS Lecturer evelyn douek In the chaos and confusion of the Coronavirus pandemic, few have stopped to …
Returns to Public Investment in Drug Discovery: Some Fundamental Questions
Fred Ledley, Ekaterina Cleary, and Matthew Jackson[1] “I am disposed to ask: “Does teaching consist in putting questions?” Indeed, the …
Voter Suppression: Disinformation and Harmful Narratives around Voting
This memo was originally written by the Disinfo Defense League (DDL) and published by their writers on August 27, 2020 …
Prioritizing Life: the Grim Irony of Capital Punishment in the Time of Coronavirus
As it has transformed almost every aspect of social and economic life in America, the Coronavirus pandemic has forced local …