Back to Annual Meeting Page		American Public Health Association 133rd Annual Meeting & Exposition December 10-14, 2005 Philadelphia, PA

Abstract #121959

Victor W. Sidel, MD, Albert Einstein Medical College and Montefiore Medical Center, Distinguished University Professor of Social Medicine, 111 East 210th Street, Bronx, New York, NY 10467, 718 920-6586, VSIDEL@montefiore.org and Oliver Fein, MD, Weill Medical College of Cornell University, 1300 York Avenue, Box 572, New York, NY 10021.

Ruth Roemer was an extraordinary pioneer in public health law who led efforts to regulate tobacco use and expand women's reproductive rights and taught health law, ethics and policy at UCLA for more than 40 years. She worked as a labor lawyer during the 1940s, representing clients such as the United Electrical Workers union. She shifted her focus to health law in the 1960s after participating in a landmark study of the laws governing admission to mental hospitals in New York State. Soon after joining the UCLA School of Public Health in 1962, Ruth helped organized the California Committee on Therapeutic Abortion, which spearheaded abortion law reform in the state. She helped lead a coalition of lawyers, doctors and social scientists in support of a landmark 1967 law that legalized abortion in special cases: for women who became pregnant as the result of rape or incest; those whose physical health was endangered by pregnancy; and for girls younger than 15 whose pregnancy might be the result of statutory rape. During the last two decades, Ruth concentrated on reducing tobacco use globally. In 1993, she co-produced a document that outlined what would become the world's first public health treaty—the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control. Aimed at reducing the adverse health impacts of the tobacco industry through legislation and guidelines controlling advertising, smuggling and taxation, the treaty was signed by 168 countries and ratified in 2003. Ruth was married for over 60 years to Milton Roemer, who was also an illustrious leader of the APHA Medical Care Section. Ruth and Milton worked tirelessly to further the work of APHA and Ruth was elected President of APHA in 1988.

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