ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that there are two potential roles of law in public health. One role is to contribute to the work that public health professionals do; that is to provide tools which can be used to protect populations from communicable and non-communicable diseases. The other role is to contribute to the work that ethics does; that is to assist in the provision of a framework for good public health practice. It focuses mainly on the laws of England and Wales, but for reasons which will later explain, much of what resonance for readers from other jurisdictions. Jurisprudential debate around law's empire over the last three hundred years or so suggests that one of the most important functions of law is the maintenance of social order. So what legal tools of social control are available to protect public health? It examines three: public health legislation, the criminal law, and law as a dictator of public attitudes.
