State Quarantine Regulations

Throughout the COVID-19 Pandemic, many US states have issued some version of quarantine, self-isolation, or “shelter-in-place” orders. Of course, these orders vary by state in terms of the level of quarantine that has been enacted.  But they also differ in terms of the content of the laws, regulations, and procedures that each state ostensibly would use when an emergency quarantine order goes into effect. Variation in state quarantine laws and regulations may create differences in the effectiveness of each state’s response to COVID-19, at least to the degree that those laws and regulations are relevant and enforced.

Research Opportunity

In the hopes of facilitating a better understanding of how each state’s existing regulatory procedures for quarantines may play a role in its COVID-19 response, we have compiled a table with links to state quarantine regulations. This was in part inspired by a similar table of state quarantine and isolation statutes created by the national conference of state legislatures. These tables perform a similar function, but gather two distinct sets of laws.  Statutes come from legislatures and typically contain a framework of laws covering a particular area, such as quarantine procedures.  But statutes usually delegate to regulatory agencies the responsibility for filling in the details.  Agencies do so by issuing regulations.  If you really want to know what the rules are regarding quarantine in a specific state, you need to look at both the regulations and the statutes.  If you’re in a hurry, you should start with the regulations – those will directly affect individuals and businesses much more often than statutes themselves will.

We hope that by providing a readily accessible table of links to state quarantine regulations, we can make it that much easier for research and discussion in this area to flourish.  Note that this is a living document and is subject to change and updating.

How the Table is Organized

Each state regulatory code is organized by subject matter into large sections which become increasingly granular as one delves deeper into the code. Generally, there is a large section called a “Title” which broadly deals with public health. Within that Title, there is usually a “Chapter” which deals with communicable diseases or epidemiology, and within that Chapter there are rules about how to report and control outbreaks of infectious diseases. Some readers may be interested in these infectious disease control protocols at large. These protocols can be found at or near the links we have provided in the table. However, the links we have provided are intended to direct the user to, as near as possible, the parts of each state’s code that deal directly with quarantine procedures and rules.

To make some of the links more clear, we have divided the table into four columns. The first is simply the name of the state in question. The next three columns have links in increasing order of granularity. These links will sometimes send the user to a webpage where the regulatory text is hosted, and will sometimes open or download a pdf or even a word file. This variation is due to the fact that state regulatory code websites differ widely in design. We are currently working on creating clean text of just the relevant quarantine and disease control regulations (to be provided as downloads in a new column in the table in the near future). This will be especially helpful for users who want to run any sort of text analysis or natural language processing software.

The second column links to the relevant communicable diseases subchapter of its state’s regulatory code. In some cases, this was the most granular level we could link to because the whole chapter is bundled in one large pdf. In these cases, a note (in brackets) underneath specifies which page(s) disease control or quarantine measures can be found on. In other cases, this was the most granular level we could link to because that state simply had no specific quarantine procedures that we could find. A note will specify if that is the case.

The third column, where applicable, links to a slightly more granular part of the state code that deals with disease control procedures. As with the second column, notes should guide the user with further information where needed. The fourth column contains the most granular level possible, and is reserved for sections that deal specifically with quarantine procedures. There may sometimes be multiple links here if there are multiple sections that deal with different aspects of quarantine. If a state has no active columns, that is because either the code was inaccessible, or there was no communicable diseases chapter to be found.

This table is a work in progress. It is attuned to the needs of the researchers and concerned citizens who use it. If a column has a dead link, or we have provided the incorrect data, or you have a general idea on how to improve the table, please email quantgov.info@gmail.com. Click here to read the blog post that introduced this project.