An upcoming Supreme Court case about using law enforcement to curb homelessness could impact Philadelphia’s efforts to address open-air drug markets. Prof. Scott Burris: “The War on Drugs resulted in incarceration, to lots of violence, the militarization of our police — and yet the one thing it has never done is control drug markets. The idea that, ‘Well, we’ve been nice for too long. It’s time to get back to what works’… It will not work.” Read More

Prof. Scott Burris says Overdose Prevention Centers can reduce opioid deaths as part of a comprehensive set of community supports, but only if policymakers are able to get community members on board. Read More

City Council’s ban on safe injection sites is “another tragic page in a tragic story,” says Prof. Scott Burris. “Philadelphia had a chance to come together to do something that needed to be done, that is backed by evidence and experience …. we should as a community [have] been able to talk it through and get to a solution.” Read More

One year after the Supreme Court struck down a NY gun control law in Bruen, Prof. Scott Burris takes aim at how the Court’s “historicism has chained us to the dead hand of a counterfactual or imaginary past.” Read More

Prof. Scott Burris, who leads Temple’s Center for Public Health Law Research, talks about how legal epidemiology can help us understand the impact of law on public health. Read More

Prof. Scott Burris explains why, from a public health perspective, California’s move to decriminalize and regulate cannabis is the right approach. Read more.

A rise in overdoses has brought renewed calls for federal funds to support needle exchange programs. Prof. Scott Burris calls the claim that such support encourages drug use “theater.” Read More

School districts in Lancaster County are wrestling with whether to enforce Gov. Wolf’s mask mandate, and the DA has said she won’t prosecute offenders. Prof. Scott Burris agrees that criminal prosecution isn’t the right approach. Read more at Lancaster Online.

When people with substance abuse disorder are incarcerated, the medications they use to treat their addiction are often withheld. Prof. Scott Burris says that jails need to rethink their approach. Read more at Daily Magazine News.

As lawsuits mount over Gov. Wolf’s mask mandate, Prof. Burris says the facts are not on their side – and that at least to courts, facts still matter. Read more at The Morning Call.