New York Slave Trade, 1698-1741

Le commerce des esclaves à New York, 1698-1741. Les origines géographiques d’une population déportée Quantitativement, le commerce des esclaves new-yorkais était d’importance modeste dans la première moitié du xviiie siècle. Cependant, compte tenu des caractéristiques de la traite, l’origine des New-Yorkais d’ascendance africaine était probablement beaucoup plus diversifiée en 1741 que ce n’était le cas partout ailleurs en Amérique du Nord ou dans les Caraïbes. Il faut cependant reconnaître qu’en dehors de quelques généralités, on sait peu de choses de la provenance des esclaves. Cet article est une première étape pour examiner cette question. En l’absence de journaux de bord, on a utilisé les documents douaniers, la correspondance officielle, la correspondance des marchands et les livres de bord pour déterminer les derniers ports touchés, le nombre de captifs et le port d’attache des vaisseaux. Cela a permis d’effectuer une distinction approximative entre ceux qui sont nés et ceux qui ne sont pas nés en Afrique. Ces indicateurs géographiques conduisent à braquer le projecteur sur des régions spécifiques : les fluctuations du marché entraînent, en effet, une réorganisation des pratiques commerciales et de la structure des marchés tout au long des côtes africaines occidentales et des îles, dans les Caraïbes et sur le continent américain. Les résultats démontrent que, vers 1741, la province de New York représentait un carrefour exceptionnel pour la diaspora africaine.In term of volume, the New York slave trade was insignifiant in the first half of 18th century. However, given the character of the trade, the origin of New Yorkers of African Ancestry by 1741 were arguably far more diverse than was the case else-where in North America or the Caribbean. Yet beyond generalities little is known about their origins. This article is a first step toward sharpening the focus. In the absence of ship journals, I have used Customs documents, official correspondance, merchant letterbooks and newspapers to construct last ports of call, numbers of captives aboard, and home ports of vessels. These permit a first broad distinction between those born and not born in Africa. These indicators in particular narrow the focus to specific regions: market fluctuations with the resultant reorganisation of business practises and market structures along African West coast and islands, in the Caribbean and on the North American mainland. The results show that by 1741 New York province harbored an exceptional cross section of the African diaspora

Molecular detection of culture-confirmed bacterial bloodstream infections with limited enrichment time

Conventional blood culturing using automated instrumentation with phenotypic identification requires a significant amount of time to generate results. This study investigated the speed and accuracy of results generated using PCR and pyrosequencing compared to the time required to obtain Gram stain results and final culture identification for cases of culture-confirmed bloodstream infections. Research and physician-ordered blood cultures were drawn concurrently. Aliquots of the incubating research blood culture fluid were removed hourly between 5 and 8 h, at 24 h, and again at 5 days. DNA was extracted from these 6 time point aliquots and analyzed by PCR and pyrosequencing for bacterial rRNA gene targets. These results were then compared to those of the physician-ordered blood culture. PCR and pyrosequencing accurately identified 92% of all culture-confirmed cases after a mean enrichment time of 5.8 ± 2.9 h. When the time needed to complete sample processing was included for PCR and pyrosequencing protocols, the molecular approach yielded results in 11.8 ± 2.9 h compared to means of 27.9 ± 13.6 h to obtain the Gram stain results and 81.6 ± 24.0 h to generate the final culture-based identification. The molecular approach enabled accurate detection of most bacteria present in incubating blood culture bottles on average about 16 h sooner than Gram stain results became available and approximately 3 days sooner than the phenotypic identification was entered in the Laboratory Information System. If implemented, this more rapid molecular approach could minimize the number of doses of unnecessary or ineffective antibiotics administered to patients