Also known as:U.S. Department of Health and Human Services · HHS · DHHS
Written by attorneys — see sources below.
An executive department of the federal government responsible for health, welfare, and income security programs. The department is headed by the Secretary of Health and Human Services and oversees agencies that administer federal grants, regulate health care, and enforce related statutes.
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Accredited Genetic Testing Lab
Diane Dawson petitions to establish paternity after a laboratory performs genetic tests on samples from her child and the alleged father. The court admits the results only after confirming that the laboratory holds accreditation from a body designated by the Secretary of the United States Department of Health and Human Services. Because the accreditation satisfies the statutory standard, the test results establish the requisite relationship index and support the parentage order.
Contraceptive Mandate Exemption
Decker Electronics, a closely held corporation, objects on religious grounds to providing contraceptive coverage required by the Affordable Care Act. The Department of Health and Human Services had issued regulations allowing certain employers to opt out through self-certification to their insurer. The court holds that the accommodation sufficiently protects the company's religious exercise while advancing the government's interest in employee health care access.
Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc.573 U.S. 682 (2014)
In 2012 and 2013, three closely held for-profit corporations—Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc., Mardel, Inc., and Conestoga Wood Specialties Corp.—along with their owners, the Green and Hahn families, filed suits against the Secretary of Health and Human Services and other federal officials.
Hobby Lobby operates over 500 stores with more than 13,000 employees. Mardel runs 35 Christian bookstores with nearly 400 employees. Conestoga employs about 950 people in its woodworking business. The Green family owns and operates Hobby Lobby and Mardel. The Hahn family owns and operates Conestoga.
Both families hold sincere Christian religious beliefs that life begins at conception. Under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010, employers with 50 or more full-time employees must provide group health insurance covering certain preventive services for women, including 20 FDA-approved contraceptive methods, without cost sharing. The Department of Health and Human Services issued regulations requiring coverage of all 20 methods. The Greens and Hahns object specifically to four methods because they believe these may prevent implantation of a fertilized egg, which they view as destroying an embryo in violation of their faith.
If the companies fail to provide the required coverage, they face penalties of $100 per day per affected employee, potentially reaching $475 million annually for Hobby Lobby, $33 million for Conestoga, and $15 million for Mardel. Alternatively, dropping coverage entirely could trigger penalties of $2,000 per employee per year. The companies and owners sued under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993, seeking to enjoin the mandate as applied to the four objected-to methods.
The District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma denied a preliminary injunction to the Greens and their companies. The Tenth Circuit reversed, holding that the corporations could assert RFRA claims. In the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, the District Court denied a preliminary injunction to the Hahns and Conestoga. The Third Circuit affirmed, concluding that for-profit corporations cannot exercise religion under RFRA. The Supreme Court granted certiorari and consolidated the cases.
Destiny Davis operates a family planning clinic that receives Title X funds. The Department of Health and Human Services issues regulations prohibiting the use of those funds for abortion counseling or referrals. The clinic challenges the rules as violating patients' constitutional rights, but the court upholds the restrictions because the government may choose not to subsidize certain activities with public money.
Rust v. Sullivan500 U.S. 173 (1991)
In 1970, Congress enacted Title X of the Public Health Service Act, 42 U.S.C. §§ 300–300a–6, authorizing the Secretary of Health and Human Services to make grants to public or nonprofit private entities for the establishment and operation of voluntary family planning projects offering a broad range of acceptable and effective family planning methods and services.
After eighteen years of administration, the Secretary in 1988 promulgated new regulations that prohibit Title X projects from engaging in counseling concerning, referrals for, or activities advocating abortion as a method of family planning. The regulations also require such projects to maintain physical and financial separation from any abortion activities. They further forbid the use of project funds for abortion-related activities even if separately funded.
Petitioners, who are Title X grantees and physicians who supervise Title X funds suing on behalf of themselves and their patients, filed two separate actions in federal district court. The actions were later consolidated. Petitioners challenged the facial validity of the regulations and sought declaratory and injunctive relief before the regulations had been applied.
The district court rejected petitioners' statutory and constitutional challenges and granted summary judgment in favor of the Secretary. The Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit affirmed. The Supreme Court granted certiorari to resolve a split among the courts of appeals.
Cleburne Living Center seeks a permit to operate a group home for individuals with intellectual disabilities in an R-3 zone. City officials deny the permit citing concerns about safety and neighborhood character. The Department of Health and Human Services standards for intermediate care facilities inform the record, yet the court finds the denial rests on irrational prejudice rather than legitimate zoning interests.
City of Cleburne, Texas, et al. v. Cleburne Living Center, Inc., et al.473 U.S. 432, 105 S. Ct. 3249, 87 L. Ed. 2d 313 (1985)
In July 1980, respondent Jan Hannah purchased a building at 201 Featherston Street in Cleburne, Texas.
Hannah intended to lease the property to Cleburne Living Center, Inc. (CLC) for use as a group home.
The home would house thirteen mentally retarded men and women under constant staff supervision.
The building contained four bedrooms and two baths, and CLC planned to add a half bath while complying with all applicable state and federal regulations for an Intermediate Care Facility for the Mentally Retarded.
The site lay in an R-3 Apartment House District.
The city's zoning ordinance permitted apartment houses, boarding houses, hospitals, and nursing homes in that district without special permission.
However, the ordinance required a special use permit, renewable annually after a public hearing, for hospitals for the insane or feeble-minded.
The city classified the proposed group home as a hospital for the feeble-minded and informed CLC that a permit was required.
After a public hearing, the City Council voted three to one to deny the application.
CLC and its prospective residents filed suit in federal district court against the city and its officials.
They alleged that the ordinance and its application discriminated against the mentally retarded in violation of the Equal Protection Clause.
The district court upheld the ordinance and the denial.
It found that the council's decision was motivated by the residents' mental retardation yet rationally related to legitimate interests such as neighborhood safety and property values.
The Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit reversed, holding that mental retardation is a quasi-suspect class and that the ordinance was invalid both facially and as applied.
The Supreme Court granted certiorari to review the equal protection issues raised by the zoning ordinance and its application to the proposed group home.
Daniel Diaz sues Davenport Pharmaceuticals after his child suffers birth defects allegedly linked to a prescription medication. Plaintiffs offer expert testimony that the drug causes limb reduction defects. The Department of Health and Human Services has continued to approve the drug based on available studies, and the court excludes the testimony because it lacks sufficient scientific support under the applicable evidentiary standard.
Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals, Inc.509 U.S. 579, 592 (1993)
Two minors brought suit against Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals, claiming they suffered limb reduction birth defects because their mothers had taken Bendectin, a drug prescribed for morning sickness to about 17.5 million pregnant women in the United States between 1957 and 1982.
Limb reduction defects occur in fewer than one birth out of every 1000. Scientists do not know the mechanism by which any teratogen causes such defects. The plaintiffs offered testimony from three groups of experts. One group proposed to testify to a statistical link between Bendectin ingestion during pregnancy and limb reduction defects based on reanalyses of published studies that had reported no such association. A second group proposed to testify that Bendectin causes limb reduction defects in humans because it causes such defects in laboratory animals. A third group proposed to testify based on the similarity of Bendectin's chemical structure to other drugs suspected of causing birth defects.
The district court granted summary judgment to Merrell Dow after excluding the plaintiffs' expert testimony. The Ninth Circuit affirmed that decision. The Supreme Court granted certiorari, reversed, and remanded for consideration under Federal Rule of Evidence 702.
On remand, the Ninth Circuit examined the affidavits and prior trial testimony of the plaintiffs' experts. None of the experts had studied the effect of Bendectin on limb reduction defects before being hired to testify in this or related cases. None had published his work on Bendectin in a scientific journal. The only review their work had received was by judges and juries.
Plaintiffs' epidemiological experts made vague assertions of a statistically significant relationship between Bendectin and birth defects but did not state that the relative risk exceeded two. With the exception of Dr. Palmer, the remaining experts were willing to testify only that Bendectin is capable of causing birth defects. Dr. Palmer alone was willing to testify that Bendectin did cause the limb defects in each of the children, based on his review of the plaintiffs' medical records and his conclusion that Bendectin is a teratogen.
Denise Donovan and her same-sex spouse seek recognition of their out-of-state marriage for federal benefits administered through programs overseen by the Department of Health and Human Services. State law refuses to recognize the marriage. The court holds that the Fourteenth Amendment requires states to license and recognize same-sex marriages on equal terms with opposite-sex marriages.
Obergefell v. Hodges576 U.S. 644 (2015)
The petitioners were fourteen same-sex couples and two men whose same-sex partners were deceased. They lived in Michigan, Kentucky, Ohio, and Tennessee. Those states defined marriage as a union between one man and one woman under their constitutions and statutes.
The petitioners filed suits in federal district courts in their home states. They sought marriage licenses or recognition of marriages lawfully performed elsewhere. James Obergefell and John Arthur traveled from Ohio to Maryland to marry aboard a medical transport plane because Arthur suffered from ALS; Obergefell later sought to be listed as surviving spouse on Arthur's death certificate. April DeBoer and Jayne Rowse, Michigan nurses, adopted three children but could not both serve as legal parents under state adoption rules. Army Reserve Sergeant Ijpe DeKoe and Thomas Kostura married in New York before DeKoe's deployment to Afghanistan and later settled in Tennessee.
Each district court ruled in the petitioners' favor. The respondents appealed. The Sixth Circuit consolidated the cases and reversed the district court judgments. The petitioners sought certiorari, which the Supreme Court granted.
Same-sex couples had begun establishing families after substantial cultural and political developments in the late twentieth century. Earlier litigation had addressed the legal status of gays and lesbians, including challenges that reached the Supreme Court in Bowers v. Hardwick and Lawrence v. Texas.
What cabinet department administers Medicare and Medicaid?
The Department of Health and Human Services oversees the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which administer those programs along with other health and welfare initiatives.
How does the Department of Health and Human Services appear in parentage litigation?
The Secretary may designate accrediting bodies for laboratories that perform genetic testing used to establish parentage under the Uniform Parentage Act.
What role did the Department of Health and Human Services play in the contraceptive mandate litigation?
The Department promulgated regulations implementing the Affordable Care Act's contraceptive coverage requirement and later created an accommodation allowing certain employers to opt out on religious grounds.
May the Department of Health and Human Services restrict the use of Title X funds for abortion-related speech?
Yes. Regulations prohibiting the use of those funds for abortion counseling or referrals are permissible because the government need not subsidize the exercise of constitutional rights.
How did Department of Health and Human Services standards factor into a zoning challenge involving a group home?
The standards for intermediate care facilities supplied background information, yet the denial of a permit was struck down because it rested on irrational prejudice rather than legitimate governmental interests.
Department of Health and Human Services
, 682 F. 3d 1 (CA1 2012) Perry v. Brown , 671 F. 3d 1052 (CA9 2012) Latta v. Otter , 771 F. 3d 456 (CA9 2014) Baskin v. Bogan , 766 F. 3d 648 (CA7 2014) Bishop v. Smith , 760 F. 3d…