Imagining a Better Public Health (Law) Response to COVID-19

This Article is not a thorough-going history of the pandemic response. By way of critique and suggesting a way forward for public health, we are going to imagine how public health—both the official agencies and the interconnected nodes in academia and health systems—might have approached COVID-19 differently. This is a story that focuses on good judgment as the lynchpin of optimal pandemic response and allows us to think about where good judgment seems to have been lacking, and how public health culture and institutions might change to improve the chances of better judgment next time.

 Evan Anderson, Senior Fellow, Center for Public Health Initiatives; Senior Fellow, Center for Health Outcomes and Policy Research; Advanced Senior Lecturer, School of Nursing; Core Faculty,
Masters of Public Health Program, University of Pennsylvania

 Scott Burris, Professor of Law and Public Health, Temple University Beasley School of Law; Di-
rector, Center for Public Health Law Research