Mental Health Law in Public Health

John Petrila J.D., LL.M., from the Louis de la Parte Florida Mental Health Institute in the Department of Mental Health Law and Policy at the  University of South Florida assesses the state of knowledge about the role of mental health law in public health, and the impact of public health laws on mental health and illness and disability in populations. Petrila elaborates a conceptual framework for new thinking about the nexus of mental health and the law from the perspective of improving population health and preventing disease and injury in populations, and explores ways in which traditional mental health law – with its roots in the civil rights movement and historical mission of institutional reform and protection of individual rights – is giving way to a broader agenda of evidenced-based public health law to improve population health, for example, by applying the principles of therapeutic jurisprudence. The paper makes recommendations for future research at the intersection of public health law and mental health law.