In this Policy Essay, Representative Patrick Kennedy argues that insurance discrimination against those suffering from mental illness constitutes a serious and often overlooked deficiency of the modern American health care system. While the Mental Health Parity Act of 1996 was an important step toward resolutions of this issue, many loopholes remain that allow insurance companies to deny much-needed coverage to those suffering from such illnesses. This Essay details how improving access to health insurance for the mentally ill is not only socially beneficial, but also economically sound; the cost of instituting mental health parity is far outweighed by the costs that employers bear because of the reduced productivity of untreated mental illness sufferers. Representative Kennedy recommends that these problems may be addressed by additional mental health policy legislation--specifically, the proposed Paul Wellstone Act.
There is little regulation of collaborative reproduction--the use of the eggs, sperm, or embryos of a third party to create a child biologically unrelated to at least one intending parent. This Article argues that the dearth of regulation should be assessed from a children's rights perspective and accordingly adjusted. After examining the effects of the experimental reproductive technologies, it concludes that traditional family law preferences and policies are undercut by the deliberate creation of collaboratively reproduced children. The lack of regulation might stem from constitutional protection afforded parents in the right of privacy and substantive due process cases. The author, however, contends that collaborative reproduction implicates the rights of children and requires a separate balancing of rights not contemplated in other cases. Collaborative reproduction also requires regulation because of its spill over effects on the acceptability of cloning. The Article concludes by offering several possible regulatory responses to the problems posed by collaborative reproduction.
On January 4, 2002, President Bush signed into law the Best Pharmaceuticals for Children Act, which is the government's most comprehensive legislation regarding pediatric research to date. The Act offers pharmaceutical companies a six-month exclusivity term in return for their agreement to conduct pediatric tests on drugs. It also provides public funding and organizes private funding to help conduct pediatric research on those drugs that pharmaceutical companies opt not to test in children. This Note reviews the history of pediatric research and traces the development of the Best Pharmaceuticals for Children Act's unique incentive and public funding structure. The Note contends that, while the Act is comprehensive and promotes important pediatric studies, its incentive structure forces consumers and taxpayers to bear the costs of testing pharmaceuticals in children instead of the manufacturers who research, develop, and market those drugs. Congress should consider mandating pediatric studies in any future enactment of the legislation.
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