Graduate Diploma in Health and Medical Law

This subject examines gender and health law. It takes an international comparative perspective – examining case studies across the globe in Europe, Asia, Australia, North and South America, etc. It draws on international law, such as the Convention on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) and the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) and incorporates World Health Organisation guidelines and documents. It will also engage students in analysis at the domestic level for various jurisdictions – including Australian commonwealth and state/territory government regulation and civil society reports.

It also explores the effect of intersecting forms of marginalisation on health rights; for example, women and gender minorities (trans and gender diverse people, intersex people, non-binary people, and others) that are members of other marginalised groups, such as disabled people, racial minorities and/or religious minorities. This subject is relevant for students who are interested in understanding modern issues of gender and health law and for those interested in exploring how to improve health law to ensure positive impacts for women and gender minorities.

Indicative list of principal topics:

• Decision-making denial to women and gender minorities in health and medical related choices (history and modern legal impacts),
• Absence of gender diversity in health and medical research (history and modern legal impacts),
• Access to health and medical care in relation to gender and intersectional identities (human rights lens),
• Gender-related medical interventions and the law, including in relation to minors (regulation of gender affirming surgery, treatments, etc.),
• Reproductive choice (women and gender minorities),
• Gaps in health and medical care in relation to gender-specific health and medical issues – and the role of the law (human rights lens) – for example, endometriosis and menopause,
• Gendered harms from health care drugs and devices. For example, vaginal mesh, breast implants, IUDs, and thalidomide.

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Following a five year inquiry and the 2017 release of the report of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses into Child Sexual Abuse after, the issue of child sexual abuse in institutional settings gained extensive attention from the public, political representatives and legal commentators. The inquiry contributed to new understandings of the incidence and extent of physical, sexual, psychological and emotional abuse in a range of institutional settings, including schools, hospitals, churches, sporting organisations, foster homes and other accommodation services. The debate on how the law may best respond to the abuse continues, with judicial attention to the now current law, and some political attention to law reform. There are many challenging issues associated with the legal redress of child abuse, including time limits for claims, liability for the criminal acts of others, the onus of proof, and the appropriate compensation regime.

This subject examines the relevant tort law in Australia and the challenges of its application to abuse situations, recent and proposed tort law reforms, and Australian ‘Redress Scheme’.

Bill Madden is a lawyer specialising in injury compensation including intentional torts and the overlays provided by statutory reform and statutory schemes. He is a regular writer and presenter on tort law topics.

Indicative list of principal topics:

• Findings of the Royal Commission
• Liability of perpetrators
• Direct liability of organisations
• Vicarious liability
• Non-Delegable duty
• Damages
• Limitation laws
• Applications to stay proceedings
• Setting aside earlier settlements
• Statutory reforms
• The Redress scheme
• Challenges

Note: This subject includes reference to material which some participants may find confronting or difficult at a personal level. Students may have differing views on some of these topics, but they do form part of the subject and may be discussed in class. Universities are neutral places for objective study and rational discussions. Any discussions on such topics in class must be respectful of differing views. The University of Melbourne Counselling and Psychological Services (CAPS) provides free, confidential, short-term professional counselling to currently enrolled students and staff, as well as a range of workshops, mental health training, and helpful resources.

View detailed information in the Handbook

The importance of health to the functioning of societies has never been more apparent than it is today. Nor has the global nature of health. Today’s major risks to health are global in nature, including the rapid spread of pathogens across borders in our highly interconnected world, and the commercial practices of multinational corporations that market harmful products. These health risks cannot be combated without international cooperation, including in preventing / limiting the spread of pathogens and regulating harmful commercial practices.

Law – at all levels, from international to national and sub-national – has a fundamental role to play in global health. It can be among the most powerful tools for protecting and promoting health, but it can also fall well short of achieving its potential, or even actively contribute to harm, if poorly designed or implemented, or where it pursues other policy objectives in ways that conflict with those of health.

This subject is called ‘Law and global health’ rather than ‘Global health law’. This reflects the reality that, while there are a range of international instruments (including both legally binding and non-legally binding) that are specifically designed to protect and promote global health, global health can be equally influenced by international instruments across diverse areas such as human rights, climate change and environment, biodiversity, animal health, intellectual property, international trade, and international investment.

While the subject will focus primarily on the instruments and organisations that are explicitly dedicated to health, it will examine the critical connections with other relevant areas of law, policy and practice.

The subject will cover both communicable diseases (including pandemics such as COVID-19, and other international health emergencies) and non-communicable diseases (such as heart disease, stroke, cancer, diabetes and chronic lung disease).

Indicative list of principal topics:

• An introduction to global health priorities, including infectious diseases, noncommunicable diseases, and climate change
• Global health narratives, concepts and approaches
• An introduction to the World Health Organization
• Global governance of infectious diseases, including the International Health Regulations (2005) and the new pandemic treaty
• Global governance of noncommunicable diseases, particularly the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, as well as international approaches to addressing alcohol use, unhealthy diets and the health effects of air pollution
• An overview of trade, investment, intellectual property and health

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Medical practitioners, policy-makers, the courts, patients and families are dealing with ongoing debates in medical ethics ranging from euthanasia, abortion, resource allocation and managing the risks of research, to issues thrown up at the cutting-edge of science where we can now edit the germline, or create new life via so-called 'synthetic biology'. While we have existing legal frameworks in place for some of these issues, enormous moral disagreements remain. How should we think about these issues?

This subject aims to provide a basic toolkit and skills to engage in deeper ethical reflection about the major debates in medical ethics and about advances in the biological and neurosciences. The goal of this subject is not to provide answers to these medical dilemmas, but to enable students to think more deeply for themselves about what their position is and to be able to justify that position to others. A variety of perspectives will be covered through the use of guest lecturers. Professor Julian Savulescu is the Head of the Centre for Biomedical Ethics, Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, National University of Singapore, the Uehiro Chair in Practical Ethics at the Uehiro Oxford Institute, University of Oxford and Distinguished International Visiting Professor, Melbourne Law School. He is a recognised world leader in medical ethics.

The subject will cover recent ethical controversies arising from the COVID-19 pandemic, including triage of patients for ventilators, the ethics of lockdown, discrimination, antibody passports, vaccination, and accelerating research.

Indicative list of principal topics:

• The current revolution in bioethical reasoning and methods in bioethics

• Making good medical/moral judgments for self and others

• Basic ethical theories and concepts

• Abortion

• Euthanasia

• Regulation of research, including:

  • Gene editing
  • Stem cell research and cloning
  • Transgenesis and human-non-human chimeras
  • Synthetic biology
  • Sale of biological material and body parts
  • Regulation of doping in sport
  • Reproductive cloning
  • Human enhancement
  • Genetic selection
  • Coercion in reproduction
  • Neuroethics

View detailed information in the Handbook

Having recently passed the 30th anniversary of the landmark Australian medical law decision Rogers v Whitaker in 2022, medical litigation remains a vibrant and challenging field given the rapid pace of scientific and social developments that generate new challenges for the law. Many developments are at the core of individual importance - birth, reproduction and personal autonomy. The legal issues are wide-ranging, covering the existence of duties, what should be considered to be a breach of duty, the challenges of legal causation and the determination of appropriate compensation- all against a background of insurance affordability, medical treatment innovations and dispute resolution process changes.

This subject examines the framework of medical litigation, current challenges and issues on the horizon. The subject coordinator Bill Madden is a lawyer specialising in medical litigation, a co-author of two health law texts and a regular writer and presenter on medical law topics.

Indicative list of principal topics:

• The history and incidence of medical litigation
• The impact of recent legal and court-based reforms
• Duty, breach of duty and statutory defences / protections
• Consent, informed consent and treatment errors
• Factual and normative causation and the loss of a chance
• The changing framework of expert evidence
• Privacy and confidentiality issues
• Alternatives to fault based compensation
• Associated regulatory issues
• Coroners’ investigations and hearings.

View detailed information in the Handbook

This subject will analyse the relationship between psychiatry, psychology and law in contemporary Australia. It will address criteria and policy relating to involuntary status and the use of coercion in relation to those with mental illnesses and intellectual disabilities, focusing on the Mental Health Act 2014 (Vic) and the Disability Act 2006 (Vic); the role of the 2013 DSM-5; fitness to stand trial; mental impairment; sentencing of offenders with disabilities; expert evidence by mental health practitioners; mental harm litigation; the role of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in civil litigation; prediction of risk in criminal law; syndrome evidence in litigation; profiling evidence; and therapeutic jurisprudence.

Indicative list of principal topics:

• Involuntary status in contemporary Australia
• The role of the Chief Psychiatrist, the Mental Health Commissioner and the Mental Health Tribunal
• The role of DSM-5 and ICD-10
• Therapeutic jurisprudence
• Mental impairment
• Expert evidence by psychiatrists and psychologists
• Sentencing of offenders with mental illnesses, brain injuries and intellectual disabilities
• Fitness to stand trial under international criminal law
• Civil litigation and complaints against mental health practitioners
• Mental harm litigation
• PTSD in the law
• Prediction of risk evidence
• Syndrome evidence.

View detailed information in the Handbook

Over the past few years there have been profound changes in the regulation and registration of the health professions. Fifteen professions are now included in a national scheme and others may join them. All of the registered professions are covered by the same legislation for accreditation, registration and the monitoring of practice, to ensure that standards are maintained to protect the public. More than 700,000 health practitioners are registered under the national scheme and, when it was adopted in July 2010, 66 acts of parliament were repealed and about 85 health professional boards were abolished. This subject will provide a detailed examination of the scheme, which has centralised the disciplinary process, with the state and territory registration bodies acting under delegated authority from the federal board. The subject will also provide an understanding of how health practitioners, their employers and educators can report ‘notifiable conduct’ of practitioners to the national regulator, and how healthcare consumers (patients) can lodge a ‘notification’ about the practice of a health practitioner. The course will scrutinise the concept of revalidation, and the health, fitness/character, performance and conduct pathways, analysing the factors that lead to different forms of disciplinary findings and determinations for different forms of problematic conduct, including sexual misconduct and serious error. It will examine what differentiates permissible from impermissible advertising, will evaluate how unregistered practitioners are now regulated and will explore how registered, unregistered and deregistered practitioners’ conduct is regulated by consumer protection legislation.

Indicative list of principal topics:

• Legal requirements for accreditation, registration and monitoring of practice of health practitioners in Australia
• The process and grounds for disciplinary action
• An examination of specific disciplinary proceedings against health practitioners, looking at issues of conduct, health, performance and fitness
• A comparison of disciplinary proceedings and other legal action against health practitioners
• Analysis of the regulatory mechanisms applicable to unregistered practitioners
• An evaluation of the new registration scheme and its operation to date
• A review of consumer protection actions that can be taken against health practitioners, both those who are registered and those who are not.

View detailed information in the Handbook

The ageing of world populations and the increased longevity of individuals has significant political, cultural and economic consequences. Ageism, the marginalisation of and discrimination against ‘older persons’, in particularly subgroups of older persons, is widespread, and involve systematic human rights violations on the ground of” older age’. This subject will review the historical development and current state of international human rights law as it applies to human rights and older age.

Indicative list of principal topics:

• Ageing historically and in the modern world – demographic trends and their significance
• Theories of ageing, the social construction and cultural significance of older age and nature, extent and importance of ageism
• Ageing and human rights: human rights of older persons or human rights in older age; intersectionality and life course approaches
• Age and international human rights law; past coverage and current developments
• Older age and domestic law and policy (Australian and comparative perspectives), including human rights dimensions of aged care
• Intergenerational equity and human rights law

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Biotechnology in Asia-Pacific is advancing at an unprecedented pace with major economies like China and Japan implementing ambitious national biotech strategies.

This introductory subject offers an accessible yet comprehensive examination of biotechnology regulations across the region, requiring no scientific background. Students will explore legal frameworks governing healthcare and pharmaceutical safety, agricultural biotechnology, GMO and gene-edited food regulations, intellectual property, data governance, and economic security, with a focus on international cooperation in commercial development and national economic security considerations. Through comparative case studies, we will examine how Asian jurisdictions balance innovation, ethical considerations, and national security while responding to public health emergencies and biosecurity incidents.

Indicative list of principal topics:

• The foundations of biotechnology regulation
• The medical and pharmaceutical biotechnology framework
• Agricultural biotechnology governance
• Biosecurity and biodiversity protection
• Biosecurity and public health systems
• Data governance
• Intellectual Property regimes
• Economic security dimensions

View detailed information in the Handbook

Expert evidence continues to play a major role in civil litigation and criminal prosecution, as well as in administrative regulation. Moreover, the field of expertise in law has become the site of numerous contemporary controversies over judicial standards for admissibility of expertise, how to evaluate the reliability of expert testimony and the ethics of experts and attorneys who present expert testimony. This subject is primarily a detailed examination of the law and policy of the regulation of expert evidence in Australia, as well as comparative reform movements of likely significance to Australia in the future, notably developments in the United States. The materials for the subject, most of which are from court files of actual cases, will emphasise the practical uses of expert evidence inside and outside the courtroom.

Indicative list of principal topics:

• The legal framework for regulating expert evidence
• Debate and controversies about expertise
• The admissibility of expert testimony
• Restrictions on the conduct of experts
• Use of expert evidence inside and outside courtrooms.

The above topics will be illuminated through the study of specific instances of expert evidence, conduct and regulation that have prompted change and reform or controversy in Australia or other countries, especially the United States.

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This subject will provide students with an understanding of key concepts in the field of leadership and enable them to more effectively assume leadership responsibilities within organisations, legal practices and/or the community more broadly. The subject aims to give students not only a theoretical understanding of leadership but practical skills and approaches that they can enact both during the course and subsequently to enhance their careers and impact. The subject focuses on the particular challenges and opportunities for lawyers seeking to have impact in modern organisations and the community through leadership. The modes of instruction will include experiential learning, transformative learning, collaborative learning and guest speaker presentations. Students will draw on their own experience of leadership (as both leaders and followers) as well as biographical and hypothetical case studies in leadership. This subject is designed for students who have worked in organisations or legal practices and who have an interest in assuming leadership responsibilities.

Indicative list of principal topics:

• A brief modern history of leadership (tracing the evolution of leadership from the industrial age to the present)
• Lawyers as leaders (the role of advocacy, emotional stability, expertise and objectivity in modern leadership)
• Harnessing human motivation
• Authority and leadership
• Leading in complexity
• Leading change
• The psychology of judgment and decision making (as individuals and in groups)
• Self as leader (preferences for behaviour, emotional intelligence, self-awareness and cognitive flexibility)
• Sustainable leadership

Students in the Melbourne Law Masters program who would like to take this subject as an elective should have a minimum of 2-5 years relevant legal work experience.

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This subject is an introduction to the foundational principles and rules of the public international legal order. It is designed to provide students with an understanding of the key concepts of international law, its history and contemporary relevance, sources of international law and the role of some key international institutions, such as the United Nations (UN). The subject is grounded in both theory and practice in order to consider how international law works in shaping and dealing with a range of global issues, including the creation, recognition and sovereignty of states, self-determination of peoples and the use of force in international relations.

Using contemporary examples and case studies which address recent and current developments, students will critically evaluate the position and relevance of international law in international politics and society.

The teaching integrates both content and skills in advanced legal research and writing. We will purposefully introduce students to the practices and protocols of advanced study in international law, as well as to the specialised knowledge and skills required of studying at postgraduate level in the Melbourne Law Masters.

Indicative list of principal topics:

• The nature, purpose and language of international law;
• Sources of international law;
• International legal personality, statehood and sovereignty;
• Jurisdiction of states and jurisdictional immunities;
• The responsibility of states for violations of international law;
• Peaceful settlement of disputes and the functions of the International Court of Justice; and
• Regulation of the use of force in international relations (jus ad bellum).

Important information about this Subject

This subject is a pre-requisite for many other international law subjects in the Melbourne Law Masters. We recommend full-time students enrol in this subject when they first start their program of study. For part-time students, International Law (LAWS70173) is the alternative five-day intensive offering.

All students enrolled in the following internationally focussed courses are strongly recommended to take either LAWS90295 Principles of International Law or LAWS70173 International Law (if you don't already have prior professional or educational background in public international law):

• Master of Environmental Law
• Master of Human Rights Law;
• Master of Law and Development;
• Master of Public and International Law;
• Graduate Diploma in Environmental Law
• Graduate Diploma in Human Rights Law
• Graduate Diploma in Environmental Law
• Graduate Diploma in International Law.

More information on course planning in the Melbourne Law Masters.

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Privacy has been valued for centuries but now there is a resurgent interest in its protection as a result of new technologies, changing social norms and a rise of markets focused on the commodity value of information. Overlapping with the resurgent interest in privacy is a related concern about the management of data flows, especially on the part of government agencies and business organisations. The legal frameworks that deal with privacy and data protection have a long history but are coming under pressure to adapt to a more complex modern environment.

In this subject, you will pay particular attention to the scope and nature of privacy protection as well as appropriate limits and exceptions, the ongoing pressures for law reform, and the practical operation of privacy and data protection laws in Australia and comparable jurisdictions.

Indicative list of principal topics:

• What is privacy?
• Conceptual and legal definitional issues
• International and comparative privacy and data protection regimes
• Protection of privacy in general law in Australia and comparable jurisdictions
• The Privacy Act 1988 (Cth): regulation of personal information held by the private and public sectors
• State/territory (especially Victorian) legislative regimes for the regulation of personal information
• Current topics in privacy law such as privacy and the media, privacy and health information, online privacy, telecommunications and surveillance privacy
• Current reform inquiries and proposals and likely reforms.

View detailed information in the Handbook

Work Health and Safety Law has grown in scope over the past decade, particularly since 2010 when most Australian governments implemented nationally-uniform laws about work health and safety. Victoria has, however, continued, with a similar but different model, and has a particularly active regulator.

This subject examines in detail the content of Victorian law, as well as the national laws, considering the operation of work health and safety law in its historical and industrial setting, as well as the likely practical operation of the regulatory regimes. The subject examines the application of safety laws to both physical risks and psychosocial risks, such as bullying and sexual harassment.

The lecturer is a practitioner with over 20 years’ experience in work health and safety, and guest lecturers from employee representative bodies and safety regulators will also present.

Indicative list of principal topics:

• The problem of work-related injury and disease
• The history of the legal regulation of health and safety at work
• The duties owed by employers and other parties under Victorian and nationally-uniform workplace health and safety laws
• Standard-setting under the Australian work health and safety statutes
• Worker representation and participation under the Australian work health and safety legislation
• State enforcement of the work health and safety legislation
• The application of work health and safety legislation to psychological health, bullying and sexual harassment
• How health and safety law has adapted to new ways of working and new challenges, such as remote and hybrid work, and COVID-19

View detailed information in the Handbook