Introduction

• Pages: xiii-xvi
• Author: Davis M. Walsh,Samuel L. Tarry

Lawyers must learn to think more like scientists. From the logistical

challenges courts face in keeping litigants safe to the novel legal and

scientic theories required to sue and defend in the post-COVID-19

world, attorneys will best promote justice and restoration by listen-

ing to emerging scientic data rather than arguing with it. The global

outbreak of 2020 turned several old trends into new realities. Public

health concerns have permanently changed some of the ways we hold

each other accountable, and professional litigators, business leaders,

and litigants need a new reference map—one that better acknowl-

edges the intersection of law and science.

This book began several months before the COVID-19 pandemic

profoundly altered human life and business around the world. Grow-

ing international travel, lax hygiene, and personal connectivity had

already accelerated the pace of communicable disease. According to

research sponsored by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, as

many as 11 million people worldwide died of sepsis—a condition

caused by the body’s reaction to an infection—in 2017.1 Modern tech-

nology offers new tools to better understand, track, and explain viral

and bacterial spread in humans. Localized outbreaks and regional

epidemics had already previewed the evolving challenges and oppor-

1. Kristina E. Rudd et al., Global, Regional, and National Sepsis Incidence and

Mortality, 1990–2017: Analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study, 396

L 207 (2020).

Introduction

Davis M. Walsh and Samuel L. Tarry Jr.

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