Book Description

"Abstract: The Oxford Handbook of Comparative Health Law addresses some of the most critical issues facing scholars, legislators, and judges. How, for example, can the law protect against threats to public health that can quickly cross national borders? How can it ensure access to affordable health care or regulate the pharmaceutical industry? Indeed, when matters of life and death literally hang in the balance, it is especially important for policymakers to get things right, and the making of policy can be greatly enhanced by learning from the successes and failures of approaches taken in other countries. Where there are "common challenges" in law and health, there is much to be gained from experiences elsewhere. Accordingly, this Handbook considers key health law questions from a comparative perspective. In health law, common challenges are frequent. In addition to those mentioned above, there are questions about addressing the social determinants of health (e.g., poverty and pollution), organizing health systems to optimize use of available resources, ensuring that physicians provide care of the highest quality, protecting patient privacy in a data-driven world, and properly balancing patient autonomy with the interest in preserving life when reproductive and end-of-life decisions are made. This Handbook's wide scope and comparative perspective on health law are particularly timely. Economic globalization has made it increasingly important for different countries to harmonize their legal rules. The many paired and complementary chapters that cover law in American and European contexts represent a novel approach that should allow scholars, students, and policymakers to develop new insight into this complex field. Keywords: health law; comparative law; EU law; UK law; US law; public health; healthcare; social determinants of health; public policy"--