Covid-19, Law, and Regulation : Rights, Freedoms, and Obligations in a Pandemic

COVID-19 is the most severe pandemic the world has experienced in a century. This book analyses major legal and regulatory responses internationally to COVID-19, and the impact the pandemic has had on human rights and freedoms, governance, the obligations of states and individuals, as well the role of the World Health Organization and other international bodies during this time.

The authors examine notable legal challenges to public health measures enforced during the pandemic, such as lockdown orders, curfews, and vaccine mandates. Importantly, the book contextualizes the legal analysis by examining the broader social and economic dimensions of risks posed by the pandemic.

The book considers how COVID-19 impacted the operation of the criminal justice system, civil litigation concerning negligently caused deaths and business losses arising from contractual breaches, consumer protection litigation, disciplinary regulation of health practitioners, coronial inquests and other investigations of unexpected deaths, and occupational health and safety issues. The book reflects on the role of the law in facilitating the remarkable scientific and epidemiological achievements during the pandemic, but also the challenges of ensuring the swift production and equitable distribution of treatments and vaccines. It concludes by considering the possibilities that the legal and regulatory responses to this pandemic have illuminated for effectively tackling future global health crises.

Belinda Bennett, Belinda Bennett, Professor, School of Law, Queensland University of Technology ,Ian Freckelton AO KC, Co-Director of Studies, Health and Medical Law, The University of Melbourne,Gabrielle Wolf, Associate Professor, Deakin University

Belinda Bennett is a Professor in the School of Law at Queensland University of Technology (QUT) in Brisbane, Australia and a member of the Australian Centre for Health Law Research at QUT. Belinda's research engages with the legal, social and ethical issues in assisted reproduction, law and genetics, and global public health emergencies. Her previous publications include Bennett and Freckelton (eds) Pandemics, Public Health Emergencies and Government Powers: Perspectives on Australian Law (Federation Press, 2021); and Freeman, Hawkes and Bennett (eds), Law and Global Health: Current Legal Issues Vol 16 (OUP 2014).

Ian Freckelton is a King's Counsel in practice as a barrister throughout Australia. He is a Judge of the Supreme Court of Nauru, a Professor of Law and a Professorial Fellow of Psychiatry at the University of Melbourne, an Honorary Professor of Forensic Medicine at Monash University, and an Adjunct Professor at Johns Hopkins University in the United States. He is an elected Fellow of the Australian Academy of Health and Medical Sciences, the Australian Academy of Law, the Academy of Social Sciences in Australia, and the Australasian College of Legal Medicine. He was appointed an Officer of the Order of Australia (AO) in 2021 for services to the law, and the legal profession, across fields including health, medicine, and technology. He is an internationally recognised author of many books and over 700 articles and chapters of books, including about health law, coronial law, disciplinary law, evidence law, tort law, and criminal law.

Gabrielle Wolf is an Associate Professor in Deakin University's Law School. She has published a monograph, chapters in scholarly books, and articles in peer-reviewed academic journals on a range of subjects, including aspects of the current and past regulation of health practitioners in Australia, health records and confidentiality, Australian and American sentencing law, and Australian theatre history. She has previously worked as a judge's research associate, as well as a lawyer in private practice and in-house.