When Terrorism Threatens Health: How Far are Limitations on Human Rights Justified

Gostin Compare L.O. , “Public Health Law in an Age of Terrorism: Rethinking Individual Rights and Common Goods,” Health Affairs, 21 (2002): 79–93, with Annas G.J. , “Perspective: Bioterrorism, Public Health, And Human Rights,” Health Affairs, 21 (2002): 94–97.

Gostin L.O. Sapsin J.W. Teret S.P. , “The Model State Emergency Health Powers Act: Planning and Response to Bioterrorism and Naturally Occurring Infectious Diseases,” JAMA, 288 (2002): 622–628. The Model State Emergency Health Powers Act is available from the web site of the Center for Law and the Public's Health, <www.publichealthlaw.net.>.

AL, AZ, CT, DE, FL, GA, HI, IA, ID, IL, LA, ME, MD, MN, MO, MT, NV, NH, NM, NC, OK, OR, PA, RI, SC, SD, TN, UT, VT, VA, WI, and WY. The Center for Law and the Public's Health, The Model State Emergency Health Powers Act State Legislative Activity (2003), at <http://www.publichealthlaw.net/MSEHPA/MSEHPA_Legis_Activity.pdf.>.

For example, public health education campaigns do not involve compulsion.

Gostin L.O. , Public Health Law: Power, Duty, Restraint (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000): At 18–21.

Compare Epstein R.A. , “Let the Shoemaker Stick to His Last: A Defense of the 'Old” Public Health, Perspectives in Biology & Medicine, 46, no. 3 (Summer 2003 Suppl.): S138–159 with Gostin L.O. Bloche M.G. , “The Politics of Public Health: A Response to Epstein,” Perspectives in Biology & Medicine, 46, no. 3 (Summer 2003 Suppl.): S160–175.

Mann J. Gostin L.O. Gruskin S. , “Health and Human Rights,” Journal of Health and Human Rights, 1 (1994): 6–22. See also Gostin L.O. , “Public Health, Ethics, and Human Rights: A Tribute to the Late Jonathan Mann,” Journal of Law, Medicine and Ethics, 29 (2001): 121–130.

International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, Dec. 16, 1966, 999 U.N.T.S. 171.

No state, even in a time of emergency, may derogate from the Convention's most fundamental guarantees such as the right to life; freedom from torture, cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, and from medical or scientific experimentation without free consent; freedom from slavery or involuntary servitude; the right to recognition as a person before the law; and freedom of thought, conscience and religion.

The ICCPR uses indiscriminately the words “limitation” (Arts 5(3) and 18(3) and “restriction” (Arts. 12(3), 19(3), 21, 22(2)). Most international law scholars interpret these terms similarly.

“Siracusa Principles on the Limitation and Derogation Provisions in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights,” Human Rights Quarterly, 7 (1985): 1–157.

See, e.g., Fitzpatrick J. , Human Rights in Crisis: The International System for Protecting Rights During States of Emergency (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1994); Lillich R.B. , “The Paris Minimum Standards of Human Rights Norms in a State of Emergency,” American Journal of International Law, 79 (1985): 1072–1081.

Universal Declaration of Human Rights, G.A. Res. 217, U.N. GAOR, 3d Sess., at 71, U.N. Doc. A/810 (1948).

International Covenant of Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights, Dec. 16, 1966, 993 U.N.T.S. 3.

Committee on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights, General Comment 14: The Right to the Highest Attainable Standard of Health, (2000), available at <www.unhchr.ch/tbs/doc.nsf/>. See Gostin L.O. , “The Right to Health: A Right to the Highest Attainable Standard of Health, Hastings Center Report, 31 (2001): 29–30.

Gostin L.O. , “The Right to Health: A Right to the 'Highest Attainable Standard of Health,” Hastings Center Report 31 (March/April 2001): 29–30.

Gostin L.O. , “When Terrorism Threatens Health: How Far are Limitations on Personal and Economic Liberties Justified?” Florida Law Review, 52 (2003):1–65.

School Bd. of Nassau Cty. v. Arline, 480 U.S. 273, 285 (1987).

See Industrial Union Dep't, AFL-CIO v. American Petroleum Inst., 448 U.S. 607, 644 (1980) (lowering benzene exposure levels required proof of “a significant risk of harm and therefore a probability of significant benefits”).

World Health Organization. Update 58 - First global consultation on SARS epidemiology, travel recommendations for Hebei Province (China), situation in Singapore. Available at: <http://www.who.int/csr/sars/archive/2003_05_17.html.> Accessed July 7, 2003.

Gostin L.O. Bayer R. Fairchild A. , “Ethical and Legal Challenges Posed by SARS: Implications for the Control of Severe Infectious Disease Threats,” JAMA, 290 (2003).

Loff B. Burris S. , “Compulsory Detention: Limits of Law,” The Lancet, 358 (2001):146.

Shah N. , Contagious Divides: Epidemics and Race in San Francisco's Chinatown (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2001).

Institute of Medicine, The Future of the Public's Health in the 21st Century (Washington, DC: National Academy Press, 2003): At 1–18.