The Debate on Excess Capacity, Issues of Competition and Time

There has been a great deal of soul-­‐searching in the economic community over the past few years. Economists of varying stripes have begun to question the academic and business paradigm which is the orthodox approach to economics. Questions of capital theory, of method, of normative philosophy are being reconsidered as the community questions the wisdom of the textbooks of Dornbusch and Bernanke, the truisms of Solow on growth and Friedman on financial markets, the intellectual sons of the marginalist revolution. The public and policymakers alike are also searching for alternatives, with proposals of a Tobin tax across Europe and occupations of Wall Street the most striking recent examples. Without doubt, the global financial crisis has done far more than simply cut the hair of the Samson of international finance, it has forced the jaws of orthodox economists to clamp down on Eve’s apple and awaken, naked and impure, outside the ivory walls and locked gates of Eden. They now lie, castrate, amongst the intellectual barrenness and moral decrepitude which was neoclassical economics. If they can open their eyes, they will see there are many rich traditions of heterodox thought which have persisted outside the bastions of economic Eden. These are not built from invisible hands, and they do not need to assume full employment or abstract from that which they do not understand to work. The theoretical underpinnings of these approaches are methodologically Babylonian, not Cartesian, and thus sustain themselves on more than just axioms (Dow, 1996). The insights of Keynes (1936), Robinson (1941), Steindl (1952), Sraffa (1960), Kalecki (1971), Marx (1971), Amadeo (1986a), White (1996), Missaglia (2007), Arestis and Sawyer (2009b), and Moudud (2010) are but a few authors whose contribution to understanding the phenomenon and implications of excess capacity cannot be understated. It would be a travesty of morality and justice for the Department of Political Economy at this University to be closed, amalgamated out, or in any other way undermined, because if there is one thing which the past few years 10 of economic experience and this body work shares in common, it is that pluralism leads to a better, greater, and more fruitful understanding. I pray the University makes the right decision

Dimethyl fumarate in patients admitted to hospital with COVID-19 (RECOVERY): a randomised, controlled, open-label, platform trial

Dimethyl fumarate (DMF) inhibits inflammasome-mediated inflammation and has been proposed as a treatment for patients hospitalised with COVID-19. This randomised, controlled, open-label platform trial (Randomised Evaluation of COVID-19 Therapy [RECOVERY]), is assessing multiple treatments in patients hospitalised for COVID-19 (NCT04381936, ISRCTN50189673). In this assessment of DMF performed at 27 UK hospitals, adults were randomly allocated (1:1) to either usual standard of care alone or usual standard of care plus DMF. The primary outcome was clinical status on day 5 measured on a seven-point ordinal scale. Secondary outcomes were time to sustained improvement in clinical status, time to discharge, day 5 peripheral blood oxygenation, day 5 C-reactive protein, and improvement in day 10 clinical status. Between 2 March 2021 and 18 November 2021, 713 patients were enroled in the DMF evaluation, of whom 356 were randomly allocated to receive usual care plus DMF, and 357 to usual care alone. 95% of patients received corticosteroids as part of routine care. There was no evidence of a beneficial effect of DMF on clinical status at day 5 (common odds ratio of unfavourable outcome 1.12; 95% CI 0.86-1.47; p = 0.40). There was no significant effect of DMF on any secondary outcome

Thigh-length compression stockings and DVT after stroke

Controversy exists as to whether neoadjuvant chemotherapy improves survival in patients with invasive bladder cancer, despite randomised controlled trials of more than 3000 patients. We undertook a systematic review and meta-analysis to assess the effect of such treatment on survival in patients with this disease

A Hot Saturn Orbiting an Oscillating Late Subgiant Discovered by TESS

© 2019. The American Astronomical Society. All rights reserved.. We present the discovery of HD 221416 b, the first transiting planet identified by the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) for which asteroseismology of the host star is possible. HD 221416 b (HIP 116158, TOI-197) is a bright (V = 8.2 mag), spectroscopically classified subgiant that oscillates with an average frequency of about 430 μHz and displays a clear signature of mixed modes. The oscillation amplitude confirms that the redder TESS bandpass compared to Kepler has a small effect on the oscillations, supporting the expected yield of thousands of solar-like oscillators with TESS 2 minute cadence observations. Asteroseismic modeling yields a robust determination of the host star radius (R∗ = 2.943 ± 0.064 Ro), mass (M∗ = 1.212 ± 0.074 Mo), and age (4.9 ± 1.1 Gyr), and demonstrates that it has just started ascending the red-giant branch. Combining asteroseismology with transit modeling and radial-velocity observations, we show that the planet is a "hot Saturn" (Rp = 9.17 ± 0.33 R⊕) with an orbital period of ∼14.3 days, irradiance of F = 343 ± 24 F⊕, and moderate mass (Mp = 60.5 ± 5.7 M⊕) and density (ρp = 0.431 ± 0.062 g cm-3). The properties of HD 221416 b show that the host-star metallicity-planet mass correlation found in sub-Saturns (4-8 R⊕) does not extend to larger radii, indicating that planets in the transition between sub-Saturns and Jupiters follow a relatively narrow range of densities. With a density measured to ∼15%, HD 221416 b is one of the best characterized Saturn-size planets to date, augmenting the small number of known transiting planets around evolved stars and demonstrating the power of TESS to characterize exoplanets and their host stars using asteroseismology

The impact of surgical delay on resectability of colorectal cancer: An international prospective cohort study

AimThe SARS-CoV-2 pandemic has provided a unique opportunity to explore the impact of surgical delays on cancer resectability. This study aimed to compare resectability for colorectal cancer patients undergoing delayed versus non-delayed surgery.MethodsThis was an international prospective cohort study of consecutive colorectal cancer patients with a decision for curative surgery (January-April 2020). Surgical delay was defined as an operation taking place more than 4 weeks after treatment decision, in a patient who did not receive neoadjuvant therapy. A subgroup analysis explored the effects of delay in elective patients only. The impact of longer delays was explored in a sensitivity analysis. The primary outcome was complete resection, defined as curative resection with an R0 margin.ResultsOverall, 5453 patients from 304 hospitals in 47 countries were included, of whom 6.6% (358/5453) did not receive their planned operation. Of the 4304 operated patients without neoadjuvant therapy, 40.5% (1744/4304) were delayed beyond 4 weeks. Delayed patients were more likely to be older, men, more comorbid, have higher body mass index and have rectal cancer and early stage disease. Delayed patients had higher unadjusted rates of complete resection (93.7% vs. 91.9%, P = 0.032) and lower rates of emergency surgery (4.5% vs. 22.5%, P ConclusionOne in 15 colorectal cancer patients did not receive their planned operation during the first wave of COVID-19. Surgical delay did not appear to compromise resectability, raising the hypothesis that any reduction in long-term survival attributable to delays is likely to be due to micro-metastatic disease

Azithromycin in patients admitted to hospital with COVID-19 (RECOVERY): a randomised, controlled, open-label, platform trial

Background Azithromycin has been proposed as a treatment for COVID-19 on the basis of its immunomodulatory actions. We aimed to evaluate the safety and efficacy of azithromycin in patients admitted to hospital with COVID-19. Methods In this randomised, controlled, open-label, adaptive platform trial (Randomised Evaluation of COVID-19 Therapy [RECOVERY]), several possible treatments were compared with usual care in patients admitted to hospital with COVID-19 in the UK. The trial is underway at 176 hospitals in the UK. Eligible and consenting patients were randomly allocated to either usual standard of care alone or usual standard of care plus azithromycin 500 mg once per day by mouth or intravenously for 10 days or until discharge (or allocation to one of the other RECOVERY treatment groups). Patients were assigned via web-based simple (unstratified) randomisation with allocation concealment and were twice as likely to be randomly assigned to usual care than to any of the active treatment groups. Participants and local study staff were not masked to the allocated treatment, but all others involved in the trial were masked to the outcome data during the trial. The primary outcome was 28-day all-cause mortality, assessed in the intention-to-treat population. The trial is registered with ISRCTN, 50189673, and ClinicalTrials.gov, NCT04381936. Findings Between April 7 and Nov 27, 2020, of 16 442 patients enrolled in the RECOVERY trial, 9433 (57%) were eligible and 7763 were included in the assessment of azithromycin. The mean age of these study participants was 65·3 years (SD 15·7) and approximately a third were women (2944 [38%] of 7763). 2582 patients were randomly allocated to receive azithromycin and 5181 patients were randomly allocated to usual care alone. Overall, 561 (22%) patients allocated to azithromycin and 1162 (22%) patients allocated to usual care died within 28 days (rate ratio 0·97, 95% CI 0·87–1·07; p=0·50). No significant difference was seen in duration of hospital stay (median 10 days [IQR 5 to >28] vs 11 days [5 to >28]) or the proportion of patients discharged from hospital alive within 28 days (rate ratio 1·04, 95% CI 0·98–1·10; p=0·19). Among those not on invasive mechanical ventilation at baseline, no significant difference was seen in the proportion meeting the composite endpoint of invasive mechanical ventilation or death (risk ratio 0·95, 95% CI 0·87–1·03; p=0·24). Interpretation In patients admitted to hospital with COVID-19, azithromycin did not improve survival or other prespecified clinical outcomes. Azithromycin use in patients admitted to hospital with COVID-19 should be restricted to patients in whom there is a clear antimicrobial indication. Funding UK Research and Innovation (Medical Research Council) and National Institute of Health Research