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Ruth Roemer
Ruth Roemer (1916 – August 1, 2005) was an American lawyer and public health researcher who championed the importance of human rights in the field of public health.
Ruth Joy Rosebaum was born in Hartford, Connecticut, in 1916. Ruth was the elder of two girls; her younger sister was Hilda Rosebaum (Kahne). Their father, a plant pathologist, died at age 37 of a bacterial infection resulting from a tooth extraction. After their father's death, Mrs. Rosebaum moved the family to Milford, Connecticut, where Ruth spent the rest of her youth.
Rosebaum attended Cornell University and graduated in 1936 with a BA degree in English. She planned to teach, but changed her mind after traveling to post-WWI Europe with the American Student Union. Motivated by her travel experiences, upon her return she resolved to do something "socially relevant." She returned to Cornell University to study law, graduating from Cornell University Law School in 1939. While attending law school, Roemer co-edited the Cornell Journal of Opinion with fellow student Milton Roemer (namesake of Roemer's law), whom she married in 1938.
After law school, Roemer represented the United Electrical Workers in Washington during the 1940s. Roemer and her husband moved to Geneva, Switzerland, in 1951, when he became the Chief of Social and Occupational Health for the newly formed World Health Organization (WHO). Soon after Milton Roemer's appointment at the WHO, the United States withdrew his appointment under the political pressure of the McCarthy era. In 1953 the Roemers moved to Saskastchewan, Canada. In Canada, Roemer worked as a researcher with the Royal Commission on Agriculture and Rural Life in Saskatchewan.
By the late 1950s, Roemer and her family had returned to the United States and Cornell University. At Cornell, Roemer worked with Professor Bertram F. Wilcox as the associate director of a research project investigating the admissions decisions of New York mental hospitals. Their research resulted in a book Mental Illness and Due Process which led to landmark New York state mental hospital admission policy legislation.
Roemer and her family moved to Los Angeles, California, in 1962, where she joined the health services faculty of University of California, Los Angeles School of Public Health. She soon became the vice president and principal organizer of the California Committee on Therapeutic Abortion. Roemer and her husband founded the national health law program at UCLA, which ultimately—with Roemer's support—became an independent organization, the National Health Law Program, in 1969.
Roemer is perhaps best known for her work crafting international tobacco control policy. A heavy smoker herself, Roemer switched from cigarettes to pipes in 1961 and quit smoking altogether in 1972. She and University of Maryland law professor, Allyn Taylor, outlined what would become the world's first public health treaty: the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control. Ratified in 2003, 168 counties have signed the treaty.
In her tenure at UCLA, Roemer taught a generation of public health students and made significant contributions to the fields of women's reproductive rights, health-law, health workforce policy and tobacco legislation. Her publications include:
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Ruth Roemer
Ruth Roemer (1916 – August 1, 2005) was an American lawyer and public health researcher who championed the importance of human rights in the field of public health.
Ruth Joy Rosebaum was born in Hartford, Connecticut, in 1916. Ruth was the elder of two girls; her younger sister was Hilda Rosebaum (Kahne). Their father, a plant pathologist, died at age 37 of a bacterial infection resulting from a tooth extraction. After their father's death, Mrs. Rosebaum moved the family to Milford, Connecticut, where Ruth spent the rest of her youth.
Rosebaum attended Cornell University and graduated in 1936 with a BA degree in English. She planned to teach, but changed her mind after traveling to post-WWI Europe with the American Student Union. Motivated by her travel experiences, upon her return she resolved to do something "socially relevant." She returned to Cornell University to study law, graduating from Cornell University Law School in 1939. While attending law school, Roemer co-edited the Cornell Journal of Opinion with fellow student Milton Roemer (namesake of Roemer's law), whom she married in 1938.
After law school, Roemer represented the United Electrical Workers in Washington during the 1940s. Roemer and her husband moved to Geneva, Switzerland, in 1951, when he became the Chief of Social and Occupational Health for the newly formed World Health Organization (WHO). Soon after Milton Roemer's appointment at the WHO, the United States withdrew his appointment under the political pressure of the McCarthy era. In 1953 the Roemers moved to Saskastchewan, Canada. In Canada, Roemer worked as a researcher with the Royal Commission on Agriculture and Rural Life in Saskatchewan.
By the late 1950s, Roemer and her family had returned to the United States and Cornell University. At Cornell, Roemer worked with Professor Bertram F. Wilcox as the associate director of a research project investigating the admissions decisions of New York mental hospitals. Their research resulted in a book Mental Illness and Due Process which led to landmark New York state mental hospital admission policy legislation.
Roemer and her family moved to Los Angeles, California, in 1962, where she joined the health services faculty of University of California, Los Angeles School of Public Health. She soon became the vice president and principal organizer of the California Committee on Therapeutic Abortion. Roemer and her husband founded the national health law program at UCLA, which ultimately—with Roemer's support—became an independent organization, the National Health Law Program, in 1969.
Roemer is perhaps best known for her work crafting international tobacco control policy. A heavy smoker herself, Roemer switched from cigarettes to pipes in 1961 and quit smoking altogether in 1972. She and University of Maryland law professor, Allyn Taylor, outlined what would become the world's first public health treaty: the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control. Ratified in 2003, 168 counties have signed the treaty.
In her tenure at UCLA, Roemer taught a generation of public health students and made significant contributions to the fields of women's reproductive rights, health-law, health workforce policy and tobacco legislation. Her publications include: