<
https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2023/03/08/covid-public-health-backlash/>
"When the next pandemic sweeps the United States, health officials in Ohio
won’t be able to shutter businesses or schools, even if they become epicenters
of outbreaks. Nor will they be empowered to force Ohioans who have been exposed
to go into quarantine. State officials in North Dakota are barred from
directing people to wear masks to slow the spread. Not even the president can
force federal agencies to issue vaccination or testing mandates to thwart its
march.
Conservative and libertarian forces have defanged much of the nation’s public
health system through legislation and litigation as the world staggers into the
fourth year of covid.
At least 30 states, nearly all led by Republican legislatures, have passed laws
since 2020 that limit public health authority, according to a Washington Post
analysis of laws collected by Kaiser Health News and the Associated Press as
well as the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials and the
Center for Public Health Law Research at Temple University.
Health officials and governors in more than half the country are now restricted
from issuing mask mandates, ordering school closures and imposing other
protective measures or must seek permission from their state legislatures
before renewing emergency orders, the analysis showed.
The movement to curtail public health powers successfully tapped into a
populist rejection of pandemic measures following widespread anger and
confusion over the government response to covid. Grass-roots-backed candidates
ran for county commissions and local health boards on the platform of
dismantling health departments’ authority. Republican legislators and attorneys
general, religious liberty groups and the legal arms of libertarian think tanks
filed lawsuits and wrote new laws modeled after legislation promoted by groups
such as the American Legislative Exchange Council, a conservative,
corporate-backed influence in statehouses across the country."
Via Violet Blue’s
Pandemic Roundup: March 9, 2023
https://www.patreon.com/posts/pandemic-roundup-79774499
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
