Public health laws are created to balance individual liberties with the health of the community. They authorize public health officials to protect public health and safety through measures like disease monitoring, vaccination requirements, and pollution regulation. While public health laws may infringe on individual rights, courts have generally upheld them when they reasonably serve the greater good. Effective public health also requires collaboration between government agencies and other stakeholders through education, policy, and preparedness for health issues like pandemics, bioterrorism, and natural disasters.

1. Public Health Communication and Advocacy
Public Health laws should be confused with medical jurisprudence, which is concerned only in
legal aspects of the application of application of medical and surgical knowledge to individuals.
It’s not a branch of medicine but a science itself, to which however, preventive medicine is an
important contributor. Public health laws is that branch of jurisprudence which treats of the
application of common and statutory law to the principles of hygiene and sanitary science.
James A. Tobey (1926)
Public health laws are created to benefit the people and balance the social life and its necessities
according to the community which includes ones liberty as well. Conventionally and traditionally,
courts have been hesitant to invalidate public health laws. One of the most relevant examples is a
case of Jacobson V. Massachusetts in 1905 who dealt with court casualties and in justification.
Many Health care organizations exhibit land mafia skills as well, they also prohibit and sometimes
ban the possession of hazardous materials. According to the Fifth Amendment, the government is
required to compensate the affected individuals whose private property rights are taken or affected
by public health law. It’s their responsibility to maintain the standard of this organization. Statues
authorize public health officials to protect and enhance the public’s health and safety. Some are
mandatory, and others are discretionary. It should maintain vital records, regulate air pollution,
and hold open or public meetings. This way every stakeholder direct or indirect can be benefited.
Discretionary factors can have; creating a waste disposal site, inspection of social serveries. Also
the privacy rights which should not go beyond limits or not be invaded. Some say immunization
requirements, compulsory HIV testing, and seat-belt laws infringe on individual rights and violate

2. the “right to privacy”. The right to privacy has been limited to intimate areas of life, which is till
imbalanced (Edwin Chadwick Master’s theses 1850).
Liability laws covering state and local health departments and employees vary considerably across
the country. During the past decade there has been numerous reports and cases occurred in which
Individuals’ health officers’ have “qualified immunity” from liability, a suit against an individual
in his official capacity means the plaintiff is seeking recovery from the government. Generally,
when you perform your public health duties in good faith and in a reasonable fashion, you are not
personally liable for damages that may result from your acts. Going into the core definition Public
law is the study of legal duties and powers of the state such that in a collaboration with its
stakeholders including partners such as the media, the academe, the community business and the
health care organizations which could ensure the conditions for people’s betterment and for them
to be healthy. Also preventive actions like identification of health risks that could be present in the
population or could damage in future. There should be set a limitation on the power of the state to
constrain for the common good. The primary objective of public health law is to go after the highest
possible level of physical and mental health in the population and it should be consistent with the
values of social justice (Vanessa Northington Gamble, MD, PhD, 1997).
The Government has some responsibilities to look after. Taking care of and implementing new
health laws are their job. The government is the public entity that’s acts on behalf of the people
and gains its legitimacy through a political process and sometimes vice versa. A democratically
elected government is always expected a lot from the people, so it’s their privileges to act/perform
duties with exercise powers to promote and protect the population’s health. Laws are designed to
promote the common good many sometimes constrains, actions like riding a motorbike without
helmet, smoking in public places which I believe should banned not only from public places but

3. also from every home. As members of society, we have common goals that go beyond our narrow
interests. It’s very important to be calm and steady towards it and deal with it patiently (Hamlin
C, Sheard S).
In the 50s decade, before the first lawsuit against the tobacco industry was filed, the cigarette was
a cultural icon. Smoking is injurious for health it’s just a preventive statement rather it must be
dealt with serious attention as this disease is damaging the population till date. During the first
wave, from 1954 to 1973, approximately 100-150 cases were filed against smoking and very few
of them managed to make it through to the trial, this is one of the sad realities of history. Further
no case did prevail the tobacco industry. Another recent case is of Ebola that arose overseas which
has come ashore to the United States, resulting in a series of effective public health responses and
high-visibility errors. Although the U.S has had one imported case from West Africa in October
27, 2014 which spread through Dallas leaving a patient from minor headache to emergency room.
The severity of Public health issues should not be taken lightly, as people are the victim of direct
impact. Evaluating novel and relatively untested vaccines can also be very dangerous and can
cause implicit diseases. In 2000, one had to conjure up examples of public health issues. Today,
examples smack us in the face almost daily. Think 9/11 and the massive emergency response that
called into service some 11,000 professional rescue workers and volunteer first responders. Think
Anthrax, SARS, smallpox, and the still present fears of bioterrorist attacks. Recall the
unprecedented destruction from natural forces of Hurricane Katrina, the Greensburg Tornado, and
the Asian Tsunami. Consider the massive resources that government authorities and private
industries have spent and continue to spend preparing for pandemic swine flu, avian flu, West Nile
virus, and other biological threats. Recall the international scare created when an Atlanta attorney
infected with drug-resistant tuberculosis traveled on commercial airline flights in

4. Europe and the United States. Advocates and policymakers regularly invoke principles of, if not
the term, public health, when advocating for programs to address obesity, gun violence, and
Human Resource policies should be sufficiently flexible in order to accommodate the staff that is
willing to volunteer to look after Ebola patients, it also includes those who are unable to volunteer
due to certain risks or health issues. Federal and state public health laws, employment, contracts
and licensed standards may require health workers to facilitate Ebola patients. It has been reported
in USA that most patients who suspect or seem to believe that they have contracted Ebola will
voluntarily seek medical care even if it includes temporary isolation from family and friends. If
the suspected patient declines to go through any medical treatment or testing then Public Health
care holds conditional privileges to appoint the suspected patient with health workers or take legal
action to minimize the risk to the public’s health (Vanessa Northington Gamble, MD, PhD, 1997).
Cases of highly infectious diseases such as Ebola with significant mortality rates heighten public
health concerns. Mitigating these fears entails affirmative public health and health-care responses
undergirded by the judicious use of legal tools and options to protect the safety of health workers
and communities and provide patients and contacts with comprehensive medical and public health
services. Balancing duties and risks at the intersection of law, medicine, and preparedness is about
assuring optimal and compassionate treatments for those who are ill and preserving the public’s
health. However the social media is playing a vital role in minimizing the effects of it in society.
The educational background of Ebola with moral and ethical values should highly be preferred so
that majority of the people get benefited (Gostin LO, Hodge JG Jr, 2015).
Public Health care authorities have a broad privilege which allows them to have the power to
institute a wide variety of measures to protect the public’s health and safety. The assurance on high
level can play a beneficial role for people.

5. The concluding reflections of Public Health care and diseases like Ebola on the field is Public
health is the science and the art of preventing disease, prolonging life, and promoting physical
health and efficiency through organized community efforts for the sanitation of the environment,
the control of community infections, the Education of the individual in principles of personal
hygiene, the organization of medical and nursing service for the early diagnosis and preventive
treatment of disease, and the development of the social machinery which will ensure to every
individual a standard of living adequate for the maintenance of health; organizing these benefits
in such fashion as to enable every citizen to realize his birthright of health and longevity (Charles
Edward Winslow 1920).
References:-
 Lawrence O. Gostin (2008), “Public Health Law: Power, Duty, Restraint” Revised and
Expanded Edition, University of California Press, Part 1-2 Sect.1-4
 Vanessa Northington Gamble, MD, PhD, (1997), “Under the shadow of Tuskegee: African
Americans and Health care” Vol.87, No.11, American Journal of Public Health.
 Edwin Chadwick Master’s theses (1850), “The Public Health Movement” University of
Birmingham Research Archive, pg.1-20
 Gostin LO, Hodge JG Jr, (2015) “Burris S. Is the United States prepared for Ebola?”
JAMA 2014; E1-2.
 Hamlin C, Sheard S. “Revolutions in Public Health: 1848 and 1998” Bulletin of the world
health Organization, 2005, 83 (11)