CHANGE IN JURY DUTY EXEMPTION REQUIREMENTS Los Angeles Superior Court has stipulated that medical students can no longer defer their jury duty service until after graduation. ONLY those students who are scheduled to participate in APPROVED school-related activities during breaks (e.g., research or volunteer work in clinics, etc.) may qualify for exemption from service, upon review and approval ...

CONTEXT School immunization requirements have played a major role in controlling vaccine-preventable diseases in the United States. Most states offer nonmedical exemptions to school requirements (religious or personal belief). Exemptors are at increased risk of acquiring and transmitting disease. The role of exemption policies may be especially important for pertussis, which is endemic in the U...

Cost-Sharing and Use of Health Services in Italy: Evidence from a Fuzzy Regression Discontinuity Design* We use a Regression Discontinuity Design (RDD) to evaluate the impact of cost-sharing on the use of health services. In the Italian health system, individuals reaching age 65 and earning low incomes are given total exemption from cost-sharing for health services consumption. Since the probab...

Financial barriers are an important obstacle for access to emergency obstetric care and a contributing factor to too slow a reduction in the level of maternal mortality. In Morocco, in 2009, a fee exemption policy for delivery and caesarean section was implemented in public maternity hospitals. As in most countries where a fee exemption policy has been implemented, fee exemption is considered s...

A CHARITABLE PURPOSE The history of tax exemption of healthcare organizations has implications for the future. Our nation's first healthcare facilities were exempt from the earliest tax laws because they were seen as clearly having a charitable purpose, providing care and shelter for the sick poor who had no place else to go. The tax code has never specified that healthcare organizations such a...

All 50 US states allow medical exemptions from school entry immunization requirements. The extent to which medical exemptions are granted and the relationship with ease of obtaining these exemptions has not previously been examined in detail. We evaluated counts and rates of state-level medical exemptions to kindergarten entry requirements over 7 school years (2004-2005 through 2010-2011). Duri...