Debt Relief under the HIPC Initiative: Context and Outlook for Debt Sustainability and Resource Flows

Debt relief, External debt sustainability, HIPC Initiative, Poverty reduction

Debt Relief under the HIPC Initiative - Context and Outlook for Debt Sustainability and Resource Flows

external debt sustainability, HIPC Initiative, poverty reduction

Anisotropy in high-frequency broadband acoustic backscattering in the presence of turbulent microstructure and zooplankton

Author Posting. © Acoustical Society of America, 2012. This article is posted here by permission of Acoustical Society of America for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 132 (2012): 670-679, doi:10.1121/1.4730904.High-frequency broadband (120–600 kHz) acoustic backscattering measurements have been made in the vicinity of energetic internal waves. The transducers on the backscattering system could be adjusted so as to insonify the water-column either vertically or horizontally. The broadband capabilities of the system allowed spectral classification of the backscattering. The distribution of spectral shapes is significantly different for scattering measurements made with the transducers oriented horizontally versus vertically, indicating that scattering anisotropy is present. However, the scattering anisotropy could not be unequivocally explained by either turbulent microstructure or zooplankton, the two primary sources of scattering expected in internal waves. Daytime net samples indicate a predominance of short-aspect-ratio zooplankton. Using zooplankton acoustic scattering models, a preferential orientation of the observed zooplankton cannot explain the measured anisotropy. Yet model predictions of scattering from anisotropic turbulent microstructure, with inputs from coincident microstructure measurements, were not consistent with the observations. Possible explanations include bandwidth limitations that result in many spectra that cannot be unambiguously attributed to turbulence or zooplankton based on spectral shape. Extending the acoustic bandwidth to cover the range from 50 kHz to 2 MHz could help improve identification of the dominant sources of backscattering anisotropy

The role of the General Practitioner in weight management in primary care – a cross sectional study in General Practice

BACKGROUND: Obesity has become a global pandemic, considered the sixth leading cause of mortality by the WHO. As gatekeepers to the health system, General Practitioners are placed in an ideal position to manage obesity. Yet, very few consultations address weight management. This study aims to explore reasons why patients attending General Practice appointments are not engaging with their General Practitioner (GP) for weight management and their perception of the role of the GP in managing their weight. METHODS: In February 2006, 367 participants aged between 17 and 64 were recruited from three General Practices in Melbourne to complete a waiting room self - administered questionnaire. Questions included basic demographics, the role of the GP in weight management, the likelihood of bringing up weight management with their GP and reasons why they would not, and their nominated ideal person to consult for weight management. Physical measurements to determine weight status were then completed. The statistical methods included means and standard deviations to summarise continuous variables such as weight and height. Sub groups of weight and questionnaire answers were analysed using the chi2 test of significant differences taking p as < 0.05. RESULTS: The population sample had similar obesity co-morbidity rates to the National Heart Foundation data. 74% of patients were not likely to bring up weight management when they visit their GP. Negative reasons were time limitation on both the patient's and doctor's part and the doctor lacking experience. The GP was the least likely person to tell a patient to lose weight after partner, family and friends. Of the 14% that had been told by their GP to lose weight, 90% had cardiovascular obesity related co-morbidities. GPs (15%) were 4th in the list of ideal persons to manage weight after personal trainer CONCLUSION: Patients do not have confidence in their GPs for weight management, preferring other health professionals who may lack evidence based training. Concurrently, GPs target only those with obesity related co-morbidities. Further studies evaluating GPs' opinions about weight management, effective strategies that can be implemented in primary care and the co-ordination of the team approach need to be done

Science's immunity to moral refutation

Our moral convictions cannot, on the face of it, count in evidence against scientific claims with which they happen to conflict. Moral anti-realists of whatever stripe can explain this easily: science is immune to moral refutation because moral discourse is defective as a trustworthy source of true and objective judgments. Moral realists, they can add, are unable to explain this immunity. After describing how anti-realists might implement this reasoning, the paper argues that the only plausible realist comeback turns on the practical nature of moral reasoning. This comeback, however, places significant constraints on the structure of evidence for moral judgments. These constraints cannot be met by coherentist defenders of reflective-equilibrium methodology or by anyone sympathetic to bottom-up, case-driven foundationalism, including those who claim we have perceptual or perception-like access to moral truths. Unfortunately for realists in these categories, alternative realism-friendly accounts of science’s apparent moral immunity are unpromising. These neither explain nor explain away our unwillingness to infer an is from an ought, as Hume might have put it. Science’s apparent immunity to moral refutation therefore poses a serious problem for any realist unhappy with top-down, theory-driven conceptions of the structure of moral evidence

On the notion of home and the goals of palliative care

The notion of home is well known from our everyday experience, and plays a crucial role in all kinds of narratives about human life, but is hardly ever systematically dealt with in the philosophy of medicine and health care. This paper is based upon the intuitively positive connotation of the term “home.” By metaphorically describing the goal of palliative care as “the patient’s coming home,” it wants to contribute to a medical humanities approach of medicine. It is argued that this metaphor can enrich our understanding of the goals of palliative care and its proper objectives. Four interpretations of “home” and “coming home” are explored: (1) one’s own house or homelike environment, (2) one’s own body, (3) the psychosocial environment, and (4) the spiritual dimension, in particular, the origin of human existence. Thinking in terms of coming home implies a normative point of view. It represents central human values and refers not only to the medical-technical and care aspects of health care, but also to the moral context

Verbal Reports and "Real' Reasons" : Confabulation and Conflation

This document is the Accepted Manuscript version of a published work that appeared in final form in Ethical Theory and Moral Practice after peer review and technical editing by the publisher. Constantine Sandis, ‘Verbal Reports and “Real” Reasons: Confabulation and Conflation’, Ethical Theory and Moral Practice, Vol. 18(2): 267-280, first published online 18 March 2015. The final publication is available at Springer via http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10677-015-9576-6 © Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015This paper examines the relation between the various forces which underlie human action and verbal reports about our reasons for acting as we did. I maintain that much of the psychological literature on confabulations rests on a dangerous conflation of the reasons for which people act with a variety of distinct motivational factors. In particular, I argue that subjects frequently give correct answers to questions about the considerations they acted upon while remaining largely unaware of why they take themselves to have such reasons to act. Pari passu, experimental psychologists are wrong to maintain that they have shown our everyday reason talk to be systematically confused. This is significant because our everyday reason-ascriptions affect characterizations of action (in terms of intention, knowledge, foresight, etc.) that are morally and legally relevant. I conclude, more positively, that far from rendering empirical research on confabulations invalid, my account helps to reveal its true insights into human nature.Peer reviewe

Pan-cancer Alterations of the MYC Oncogene and Its Proximal Network across the Cancer Genome Atlas

Although theMYConcogene has been implicated incancer, a systematic assessment of alterations ofMYC, related transcription factors, and co-regulatoryproteins, forming the proximal MYC network (PMN),across human cancers is lacking. Using computa-tional approaches, we define genomic and proteo-mic features associated with MYC and the PMNacross the 33 cancers of The Cancer Genome Atlas.Pan-cancer, 28% of all samples had at least one ofthe MYC paralogs amplified. In contrast, the MYCantagonists MGA and MNT were the most frequentlymutated or deleted members, proposing a roleas tumor suppressors.MYCalterations were mutu-ally exclusive withPIK3CA,PTEN,APC,orBRAFalterations, suggesting that MYC is a distinct onco-genic driver. Expression analysis revealed MYC-associated pathways in tumor subtypes, such asimmune response and growth factor signaling; chro-matin, translation, and DNA replication/repair wereconserved pan-cancer. This analysis reveals insightsinto MYC biology and is a reference for biomarkersand therapeutics for cancers with alterations ofMYC or the PMN

Pan-Cancer Analysis of lncRNA Regulation Supports Their Targeting of Cancer Genes in Each Tumor Context

Long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) are commonly dys-regulated in tumors, but only a handful are known toplay pathophysiological roles in cancer. We inferredlncRNAs that dysregulate cancer pathways, onco-genes, and tumor suppressors (cancer genes) bymodeling their effects on the activity of transcriptionfactors, RNA-binding proteins, and microRNAs in5,185 TCGA tumors and 1,019 ENCODE assays.Our predictions included hundreds of candidateonco- and tumor-suppressor lncRNAs (cancerlncRNAs) whose somatic alterations account for thedysregulation of dozens of cancer genes and path-ways in each of 14 tumor contexts. To demonstrateproof of concept, we showed that perturbations tar-geting OIP5-AS1 (an inferred tumor suppressor) andTUG1 and WT1-AS (inferred onco-lncRNAs) dysre-gulated cancer genes and altered proliferation ofbreast and gynecologic cancer cells. Our analysis in-dicates that, although most lncRNAs are dysregu-lated in a tumor-specific manner, some, includingOIP5-AS1, TUG1, NEAT1, MEG3, and TSIX, synergis-tically dysregulate cancer pathways in multiple tumorcontexts

Genomic, Pathway Network, and Immunologic Features Distinguishing Squamous Carcinomas

This integrated, multiplatform PanCancer Atlas study co-mapped and identified distinguishing molecular features of squamous cell carcinomas (SCCs) from five sites associated with smokin