At our Fourth Mini-Conference on Coronavirus and Law, Professor Alan Z. Rozenshtein gave an excellent talk titled “Disease Surveillance and the Fourth Amendment.” Here are the slides from his talk. His key points are that we are going to need disease surveillance, that currently the Fourth Amendment allows almost anything along these lines, and that we therefore will need additional safeguards. Professor Rozenshtein argues these safeguard should be found within the Fourth Amendment itself.
Professor Rozenshtein has been blogging about coronavirus and Fourth Amendment issues at Lawfare blog. His “Disease Surveillance and the Fourth Amendment” post provides a nuanced explanation of the doctrine in this area, and his “Government Surveillance in an Age of Pandemics” post provides useful historical and global context.