Writing Assignment #1
When, for the sake of creating a sound public health policy intended to keep a population of individuals healthy, does it make sense to regulate our individual freedoms and when does it not? Take, as one example, vaccination policy, which, to be effective, depends not just on one or two individuals making decisions on behalf of themselves and their children, but other strangers making their own decisions as well. As another example consider our current pandemic. Have we suffered in America because we are a nation of individual choosers and pursuers, focused on individual liberties, as opposed to seeing ourselves as a population, one people all in this together? If so, how so? In your answer, address at least FIVE of the eight articles listed on this syllabus for Reading 5, 8 and 9AND make reference to Debora MacKenzies book, Covid 19: The Pandemic that Never Should Have Happened and How to Stop the Next One.
APA format
Readings 5:

1.    Andrew Flescher and Geoffrey Kabat, Heard Immunity —In An age of Vaccine Skepticism, It is critical to Understand Herd Immunity, https://www.forbes.com/sites/geoffreykabat/2018/02/26/heard-immunity/#5fa6703a1399

2.    Owen Dyer, US Healthcare Company Fires 69 Employees for Flu Vaccinations, (2017) http://www.bmj.com/content/359/bmj.j5473

3.    Daniel S. Goldberg: Against the Very Idea of Politicization in Public Health, American Journal of Public Health V. 102, no. 1 (January 2012), 44-49. See https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3490541/

4.    Jean-Frederick Menard, A Nudge for Public Health Ethics: Libertarian Paternalism as a Framework for Ethical Analysis of Public Health Interventions. Public Health Ethics, V. 3, no. 3 (2010), 229-238. https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/99a8/3bbd20adce36015510e04ba4547fce5268c7.pdf?_ga=2.215418327.150839819.1517426101-235163504.1517426101

5.    Peter Shawn Taylor, Public health officers should focus on disease, not politics, The Globe and Mail, November, 2014 https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/public-health-officers-should-focus-on-disease-not-politics/article21610596/

6.    Aaron Carol, Still Not Convinced You Need a Flu Shot? First, Its Not all about You, New York Times (2018):
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/15/upshot/flu-shot-deaths-herd-immunity.html

7.    Frank DeFestano, et. al. Principal Controversies in Vaccine Safety in the United States, (February, 2019), Clinical Infectious Diseases  https://academic.oup.com/cid/advance-article/doi/10.1093/cid/ciz135/5316263?fbclid=IwAR1R4_L0ijjjZtfDbCp3vAULjy9N-K2PtUCrtiVQb3Vr_xsmuhPQioTw9XA#.XGnEPSsmrG8.facebook

8.    John P. Reilly: Mandatory Vaccines: The Right Public Health Decision (2019), SILIVE https://www.silive.com/news/2019/07/mandatory-vaccines-the-right-public-health-decision-commentary.html

Readings 8, 9:

1.    Kaiser Family Foundation. (2011). Focus on Health Care Reform: Summary of New Health Reform Law. http://kff.org/health-reform/fact-sheet/summary-of-the-affordable-care-act/

2.    Kelly Montgomery, Differences between Universal Coverage and Single Payer, Very Well Health (October, 2018)  https://www.verywellhealth.com/difference-between-universal-coverage-and-single-payer-system-1738546

3.    Barack Obama, United States Health Care Reform, JAMA Published on line (July 11, 2016) See: http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=2533698

4.    New York Times editorial: Obamacares Kindest Critic, (July 17th, 2016) See: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/17/opinion/obamacares-kindest-critic.html?_r=0

5.    Aaron Kesselheim, et. al., The High Cost of Prescription Drugs in the United States, (August 2016) http://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2545691

6.    Austin Frakt, Hidden From View: The Astonishingly High Administrative Costs of U.S. Health Care (July 16th, 2018) https://nyti.ms/2LmDCNV

7.    Adam Gaffner, What the Health Care Debate Still Gets Wrong, Science and Nature (October 17th, 2019) http://bostonreview.net/science-nature/adam-gaffney-what-health-care-debate-still-gets-wrong

8.    Jessica Glenza, Dismantling Obamacare: what has Trump done and who will it affect?, The Guardian, (10/13/2017): https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/oct/13/healthcare-donald-trump-obamacare-executive-orders

9.    Kevin Pham, U.S. Must avoid a Single-Payer Health Care System that Stresses Doctors to the Breaking Point, The Heritage Foundation (2018): https://www.heritage.org/health-care-reform/commentary/us-must-avoid-single-payer-health-care-system-stresses-doctors-the

10.    Jennifer Prah Ruger, ret. Al., The Elusive Right to Health Care Under US Law, New England Journal of Medicine, June (2015)  See  https://www.nejm.org/doi/pdf/10.1056/NEJMhle1412262