Jennifer Oliva

Good News that sounds like bad news: The District of Hawaii just found the FDA's 2023 mifepristone REMS modification unlawful and arbitrary & capricious! It's good news b/c the case was brought by medical orgs & docs arguing that FDA failed to justify why it kept strict & unnecessary REMS elements.

Citing Trump Order on “Biological Truth,” VA Makes It Harder for Male Veterans With Breast Cancer to Get Coverage A Department of Veterans Affairs memo obtained by ProPublica erects new roadblocks to care for veterans with the rare but deadly cancer. The agency cites no new science but relies on an executive orde...

The anti trans hysteria is killing male veterans with cancer.

www.propublica.org/article/vete...

Third-Party Accommodations, Doron Dorfman Abstract Does disability rights law impose an obligation on employers, schools, and other places of public accommodation to control the behavior of coworkers, students, or other third parties to accommodate an individual with disabilities? This Article examines that unexplored legal question and shows that the law frequently fails to protect people with disabilities from the choices and behaviors of third parties. Judges often consider these major barriers to access beyond the reach of the Americans with Disabilities Act’s reasonable accommodation mandate. This Article argues that this problem results from improperly imposing the privity paradigm, a doctrine that limits the inquiry about the reasonableness of an accommodation relative to the relationship between the first party (the disabled individual) and the second party (the employer or other entity covered by the Americans with Disabilities Act). Using disability studies, legal theory, and political economy analysis, this Article shows how a narrow interpretation of the reasonable accommodation mandate has failed to adapt to our modern understanding of disability as a complex interaction between the impairment and the social environment. To address the issue, this Article introduces a new theory of third-party accommodations, which would require others to alter or cease behaviors to accommodate an individual with disabilities. This Article then suggests a normative framework that courts can use to analyze cases involving requests for third-party accommodations, including the factors that judges should balance to determine the reasonableness of a request. In highlighting the need to move beyond a constricted interpretation of reasonable accommodation, this Article imagines a new horizon for disability justice.

I am just thrilled to have my new article Third-Party Accommodations officially out @michlawreview.bsky.social! The MLR editors were a pleasure to work with and sharing the same volume as @kovarsky.bsky.social & Daniel Fryer is the cherry on top. Read it: repository.law.umich.edu/mlr/vol124/i...

This is just bananas. Whew.

Oregon and Vermont are also seeing premium spikes due to expiring tax credit enhancements, as their window shopping is underway for 2026 ACA marketplace plans. A typical 60-year-old Oregonian couple making $85,000 will face a $20,700 increase in annual premiums. (1/4)

YouTube video by Democracy Docket Is Trump Planning a Military Takeover? | Professor David Noll

Prof. David Noll joins me to talk about the growing threats to American democracy, the rise of authoritarianism, and how Trump’s second term agenda could erode the rule of law. He unpacks the dangers of state-sponsored vigilantism, election subversion, and the weaponization of the legal system.

This Little-Known Appeal Could Force Your Insurer to Pay for Lifesaving Care. Here’s How to File It. When a health insurer refuses to pay for your treatment, you may have the right to have the denial reviewed — and potentially overturned — by an independent provider. Here are six steps experts sugges...

In Connecticut, the health care advocate office — whose services are free — has been able to resolve or overturn insurance denials in the patient’s favor about 80% of the time.

Check to see if your state has a similar consumer assistance program:

COVID vaccine during pregnancy helps the baby too A new study shows that the COVID vaccine during pregnancy protects both the mother and baby, reducing risks of preterm birth and stillbirth.

"A new, large study has provided powerful evidence that when the mother receives the COVID vaccine during pregnancy, it not only protects the mom but also protects the baby."
www.skepticalraptor.com/skepticalrap... via @skepticalraptor.bsky.social

How to Fight Your Health Insurance Denial with an External Appeal When a health insurer refuses to pay for your treatment, you may have the right to have the denial reviewed — and potentially overturned — by an independent provider. Here are six steps experts sugges...

Few patients appeal a health insurance denial, but a little-known process that requires insurers and plans to seek an independent opinion can force insurers to pay for what can be lifesaving treatment.

Here’s what experts say you need to know.

Trump Administration Lays Off Dozens of C.D.C. Officials

FULL STORY HERE: Emails began flooding CDC inboxes late Friday night announcing dozens of layoffs. HR people brought back from furlough to oversee the RIFs. Disease detectives, entire Washington office, global health, injury prevention, MMWR staff among those hit.
www.nytimes.com/2025/10/11/u...

For-Profit Corporations Are Buying Up More Psychiatric Hospitals. Some Flout Federal Law With Scarce Repercussions. Psychiatric hospitals — increasingly owned by for-profit corporations — are illegally turning away patients during crises. Yet only a handful face penalties, with fines that are trivial, a ProPublica investigation found.

According to this @propublica.org investigation, psychiatric hospitals are denying care to patients they are legally required to treat. And 80% are owned by for-profit corporations. 

Annual COVID Vaccines Save Lives, New Study Shows A new study shows that receiving an updated COVID vaccine reduced people’s risk of severe disease and death in all age groups, regardless of immunity from prior infection or vaccination

"A study... showed that last season’s 2024–2025 mRNA COVID vaccines reduced people’s risk of emergency department visits by 29 percent, their risk of hospitalizations by 39 percent and their risk of death by 64 percent. ”"
www.scientificamerican.com/article/new-...

KFF graphic titled "If ACA Enhanced Premium Tax Credits Expire, Marketplace Premiums Could More Than Double for Many Enrollees. New KFF Polling Shows:" It includes two sections of data from a KFF Health Tracking Poll (September 23-29, 2025). On the left, blue circles illustrate that 7 in 10 of those who purchase their own insurance say they could not afford their coverage if premiums doubled. On the right, green circles show that about 4 in 10 Marketplace enrollees would go without health insurance coverage if premiums doubled.

As Congress debates the future of the ACA’s enhanced premium tax credits, new KFF polling finds significant concern about affordability if they expire at the end of the year.

Explore the findings: https://on.kff.org/4q7ElGy

Thrilled that HLPP is hosting Risk and Resistance on Oct 3! Honored to celebrate @azizaahmed.bsky.social’s groundbreaking book and so grateful to our amazing co-sponsors, speakers, and panelists who will make this such an inspiring event.
#RiskandResistance
#healthlaw

County Vaccination Coverage, USA TODAY Explore county-level vaccination coverage, recent measles outbreaks and states with rising non-medical exemption rates

Search by county to see vaccination coverage among children for MMR and whether the county has reached herd immunity levels

Not to pile on, but this is important & not getting enough discussion in the wake of the vaccine and Tylenol debates! It got me thinking about a piece I wrote about how Dobbs would make it even more difficult to enroll participants who are pregnant or capable of pregnancy in clinical trials…

My conversation today with @drtomfrieden.bsky.social, Former CDC Director, on his new book THE FORMULA and our current state of affairs in US public health
erictopol.substack.com/p/tom-friede...

Who Goes Nazi?, by Dorothy Thompson

Every few months now I re-read this "Who Goes Nazi?" piece from 1941 and am blown away by how it captures the people we are dealing with 80 years later.

harpers.org/archive/1941...

Totally agree @rickweinmeyer.bsky.social and finally wrote an essay about this topic last year that I had disgracefully neglected in my earlier academic days (and citing your great work!). Available here: papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

Tracking U.S. Measles Outbreaks (Gift Article) As new cases are reported, our maps show the spread of the virus.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has reported 1,514 measles cases as of Sept. 24, the highest number of annual cases since the United States declared measles eliminated in 2000.

Gift link.

www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

Is that a bug up there?

Let's talk about Tylenol and pregnancy.

Fundamentally, this is about making sure women do not get one ounce of relief, but it's also about criminalization.

How long do you think it's going to be before they arrest someone for taking Tylenol during a pregnancy? We are going down that road.

“[T]he program has cost federal and state taxpayers more than $86.9 million while enrolling a tiny fraction of those eligible for free health care.”

A poster for the talk: The Limits of the ADA: Exploring the Duty to Accommodate in Law & Society by Doron Dorfman, Thursday, Sep. 25 at 5 pm at the Riggs Library - Healy Hall. ASL interpreted. A photo of a man with dark hair and glasses smiling alongside a photo of signing the ADA into law.

Thrilled to be giving a talk on The Limits of the ADA’s Duty to Accommodate @oneillinstitute.bsky.social (@georgetownlaw.bsky.social) & the Georgetown Program in Disability Studies tomorrow (Sep. 25) at 5 pm. If you’re around, please join us. Details below 👇

"In SW UT, all but one of the 23 confirmed cases are among unvaccinated, school-age kids, the Southwest Utah Public Health Department reported. In Mohave Cnty., AZ, which health officials believe is connected to the Utah outbreak, there have been 42 confirmed cases of the highly contagious virus."

A table with about a dozen various handcrafted pipe cleaner creations, including a pumpkin, a spider, and blue and yellow flowers, as well as a copy of the Bingo card, an "I heart SLU Health Law" sticker, and a small potted mum.

Wow, the 2025 Health Law Scholars Workshop is officially in the books!
@davidasimon.bsky.social @benjaminabarsky.bsky.social @rickweinmeyer.bsky.social

YouTube video by Nike SHE IS WHO SHE THINKS SHE IS | NIKE

Sheryl Lee Ralph narrates and asks the question, “Who does A’ja Wilson think she is?!”

Answer: She is, who she thinks she is.

Nike did that!

#WNBA #WNBASky #Nike #AjaWilson

AI medical tools downplay symptoms in women and ethnic minorities Large language models reflect biases that can lead to inferior healthcare advice to female, Black and Asian patients

AI medical tools downplay symptoms in women and ethnic minorities on.ft.com/46ILa9z

JUST IN: Vaccine advisers to the CDC have voted to recommended against using the combined measles, mumps, rubella and chickenpox vaccine for children under 4. https://cnn.it/3K73pNn

The Minnesota #Lynx have done it.

Minnesota erases a 17-point deficit, outscores Golden State 26-11 in the fourth quarter and takes Game 2 75-74 to sweep the first-round series and advance to the semifinals.

What. A. Game.

Wow.

#WNBAPlayoffs