Sean Bland works at the intersection of law and public health with teaching interests in health law, contract law, race and the law, and sexuality, gender, and the law. He is interested in legal and social issues that impact the health and wellbeing of marginalized communities, including racial and ethnic minorities, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) people, people who engage in sex work, and people who use drugs. His scholarship draws on his background in public health research and his policy work focused on building robust and equitable legal and policy responses to the HIV epidemic and the intersecting epidemics of other infectious diseases and substance use disorders. He has authored and co-authored publications in the Journal of the American Medical Association, The Lancet, and other journals, as well as numerous reports and policy briefs.

Before coming to Santa Clara Law, Bland was a Senior Associate at the O’Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law based at Georgetown University Law Center. Prior to that, he was a litigation associate at Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson LLP, and he served as a law clerk with the United States Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions, the American Psychological Association, and Lambda Legal, where he held the 2011 Tyron Garner Memorial Fellowship for African-American LGBT Civil Rights. He earned a J.D. from Georgetown University Law Center and a B.A. in psychology and German Studies from Yale University.