Suing others for spread of disease ignores dynamics of infectious disease

In this post in the Center for Global Development's (CGD) "Global Health Policy" blog, Victoria Fan, a research fellow at the CGD, and Richard Cash, senior lecturer on global health at the Harvard School of Public Health's Department of Global Health and Population, report on a lawsuit brought forth against the U.N. on behalf of some of Haiti's 15,000 cholera victims, writing that "the thought of suing the 'sending' government -- Mexico for H1N1, India for polio, etc. -- for the spread of these diseases seems absurd because it does not recognize the dynamics of infectious diseases" (1/11).