Book Review on Stephen L. Morgan (2021). The Chinese Economy

China followed a Soviet-style model for the economy from 1953 to 1978. Then Deng Xiaoping's economic ideas were implemented. The result was a marked decrease in poverty. Regarding personal freedoms, that has increased sometimes and decreased others since the founding of the People’s Republic of China. Morgan, a Professor of Chinese history at Nottingham University, clearly presents the significant facets of China’s economy

An Introduction to a Way of Increasing Chinese International Influence: The Implementation of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI)

This article is written for a general audience of economists, including those who have a novice understanding of this subject. China continues to become more important in the community of nations. In order\to promote further internationalization of China’s influence, major strategies are being pursued. The focus of this article is the implementation of the ambitious program of the Belt Road Initiative (BRI). Within China, this program is called One Belt One Road (Chinese: 一带一路; pinyin: Yīdài Yīlù) or OBOR for short. This is a global infrastructure development strategy adopted by the Chinese government in 2013 to invest in more than 150 countries and international organizations (World Bank, 2019). This article states that China benefits from the BRI and it was found that lower- and middle-income countries are more inclined to join the BRI, in comparison to high income countries This tendency is not 100 percent true. Simultaneously, there is the effort to increase the use of Chinese Renminbi (RMB) in transactions between all nations. (Chinese yuan is another phrase for RMB.) The Chinese RMB already has attained the status of reserve currency (Gentle, 2016). Of course, there is a lot of synergy between the implementation of the BRI and other means for increasing the international presence of China. This article asks the research question of does the BRI increase China’s international presence in the BRI? The answer is yes, considering the many countries, organizations and projects involved in the BRI. Tables in this article convey this information. This article may serve as a broad introduction to the BRI. The reader can thus move on to explore what other researchers have done on this issue

EXAMINING THE CRB INDEX AS AN INDICATOR FOR U.S. INFLATION

This paper analyzes historical movements in the commodity futures market and the relationship to inflation. Specifically, the relationship between the Commodity Research Bureau (CRB) Index and United States inflation is investigated. It is said that the relationship between the CRB index and the U.S. inflation rate was greater in the some periods than in another period. Then in recent times the CRB Index has proven to be a reliable early indicator of inflation. As the composition of the United States economy changes, the Commodity Research Bureau must make adjustments in order to provide a viable service.CRB index, Commodities Research Bureau, inflation, Vector Autoregression, Marketing, Public Economics, E00, E30,

Farmers and Social Security Reform

Agricultural Finance,

THE USE OF PRIVATE LANDS IN THE U.S. FOR OUTDOOR RECREATION: RESULTS OF A NATIONWIDE SURVEY

Land Economics/Use, Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,

Molecular mechanisms of cell death: recommendations of the Nomenclature Committee on Cell Death 2018.

Over the past decade, the Nomenclature Committee on Cell Death (NCCD) has formulated guidelines for the definition and interpretation of cell death from morphological, biochemical, and functional perspectives. Since the field continues to expand and novel mechanisms that orchestrate multiple cell death pathways are unveiled, we propose an updated classification of cell death subroutines focusing on mechanistic and essential (as opposed to correlative and dispensable) aspects of the process. As we provide molecularly oriented definitions of terms including intrinsic apoptosis, extrinsic apoptosis, mitochondrial permeability transition (MPT)-driven necrosis, necroptosis, ferroptosis, pyroptosis, parthanatos, entotic cell death, NETotic cell death, lysosome-dependent cell death, autophagy-dependent cell death, immunogenic cell death, cellular senescence, and mitotic catastrophe, we discuss the utility of neologisms that refer to highly specialized instances of these processes. The mission of the NCCD is to provide a widely accepted nomenclature on cell death in support of the continued development of the field

Impact of opioid-free analgesia on pain severity and patient satisfaction after discharge from surgery: multispecialty, prospective cohort study in 25 countries

Background: Balancing opioid stewardship and the need for adequate analgesia following discharge after surgery is challenging. This study aimed to compare the outcomes for patients discharged with opioid versus opioid-free analgesia after common surgical procedures.Methods: This international, multicentre, prospective cohort study collected data from patients undergoing common acute and elective general surgical, urological, gynaecological, and orthopaedic procedures. The primary outcomes were patient-reported time in severe pain measured on a numerical analogue scale from 0 to 100% and patient-reported satisfaction with pain relief during the first week following discharge. Data were collected by in-hospital chart review and patient telephone interview 1 week after discharge.Results: The study recruited 4273 patients from 144 centres in 25 countries; 1311 patients (30.7%) were prescribed opioid analgesia at discharge. Patients reported being in severe pain for 10 (i.q.r. 1-30)% of the first week after discharge and rated satisfaction with analgesia as 90 (i.q.r. 80-100) of 100. After adjustment for confounders, opioid analgesia on discharge was independently associated with increased pain severity (risk ratio 1.52, 95% c.i. 1.31 to 1.76; P < 0.001) and re-presentation to healthcare providers owing to side-effects of medication (OR 2.38, 95% c.i. 1.36 to 4.17; P = 0.004), but not with satisfaction with analgesia (beta coefficient 0.92, 95% c.i. -1.52 to 3.36; P = 0.468) compared with opioid-free analgesia. Although opioid prescribing varied greatly between high-income and low- and middle-income countries, patient-reported outcomes did not.Conclusion: Opioid analgesia prescription on surgical discharge is associated with a higher risk of re-presentation owing to side-effects of medication and increased patient-reported pain, but not with changes in patient-reported satisfaction. Opioid-free discharge analgesia should be adopted routinely