HIV And The Need For A Voluntarist Approach

After a decade of fighting AIDS, the public health community has come to recognize that strategies to combat the infection must be premised on voluntarism and not on coercion. Attempts to combat AIDS with coercive public health strategies stem from a desire to force AIDS into an ill-fitting traditional disease-response framework, overlooking the differences between HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases, including the limitations in available treatment modalities for HIV. A return to such a cramped, narrowly-medicalized view of the AIDS epidemic has enormous social implications and a coercive strategy would frustrate efforts to stem the spread of the disease. Further, such strategies would hamper the willingness of those in need of medical care and education to benefit from existing programs. This essay explores some of the possible explanations for the apparent erosion of the voluntarist consensus and calls for a return to such a voluntarist approach through effective health care and education efforts

HIV And The Need For A Voluntarist Approach

After a decade of fighting AIDS, the public health community has come to recognize that strategies to combat the infection must be premised on voluntarism and not on coercion. Attempts to combat AIDS with coercive public health strategies stem from a desire to force AIDS into an ill-fitting traditional disease-response framework, overlooking the differences between HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases, including the limitations in available treatment modalities for HIV. A return to such a cramped, narrowly-medicalized view of the AIDS epidemic has enormous social implications and a coercive strategy would frustrate efforts to stem the spread of the disease. Further, such strategies would hamper the willingness of those in need of medical care and education to benefit from existing programs. This essay explores some of the possible explanations for the apparent erosion of the voluntarist consensus and calls for a return to such a voluntarist approach through effective health care and education efforts

Research paper: firm dynamics and productivity growth in Australian manufacturing and business services, Oct 2014

This paper examines the productivity of firms in manufacturing and business services, particularly the contribution of entry and exit to aggregate productivity growth. Abstract Competitive markets foster the reallocation of inputs where resources are channelled from less competitive to more competitive firms, and hence increase aggregate productivity. The turnover of firms entering and exiting industries is part of this competitive process as entrants vie for market shares and exiters cease consuming inputs. There is a large body of theoretical and empirical work on firm dynamics, yet to date very few large scale studies have been conducted in Australia due to limited access to firm-level data. This study uses a large panel of businesses, drawn from administrative data provided to the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS), which allows us to track firms over the nine years from 2002–03 to 2010–11. Using this comprehensive panel we examine the productivity of firms in manufacturing and business services and, in particular measure the contribution of entry and exit to aggregate productivity growth. We find that exiting firms not only have low productivity relative to established firms in the year prior to exit, but the productivity gap is observed many years before they depart the market. Entrants grow most rapidly in their second year of operation, but after five years are still ten per cent below the productivity level of established firms. At the division level, the main driver of productivity growth is continuing firms, and the net impact of firm turnover is relatively modest. However, among the studied industries, net entry can be significant – a fact masked by the higher level of aggregation. Over the nine year period, entry lowered aggregate productivity growth by 13 per cent in manufacturing and 23 per cent in business services as entrants were less productive than continuing firms. In contrast, exiting firms raised productivity by 12 per cent in manufacturing, and 23 per cent in business services

Mild and facile synthesis of multi-functional RAFT chain transfer agents

In this paper we will describe the synthesis and characterization of a series of novel chain transfer agents for application in reversible addition fragmentation chain transfer polymerization (RAFT). The facile and mild conditions used for the synthesis of these new chain transfer agents should allow for the application of these methods for the preparation of a wide range of multifunctional chain transfer agent species. Some initial polymerization data for these multifunctional chain transfer agents is also reported

Putting Community First: A Promising Approach to Federal Collaboration for Environmental Improvement: An Evaluation of the Community Action for a Renewed Environment (CARE) Demonstration Program

This report is an independent evaluation of the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) Community Action for a Renewed Environment (CARE) Demonstration Program, a community-driven process that uses the best available data to help communities set priorities and take action on their greatest environmental risks. CARE fosters local partnerships that seek participation from business, government, organizations, residents and EPA staff. It also supports a public, transparent planning and implementation process based on collaborative decision-making and shared action.Key FindingsThe National Academy Panel overseeing this effort was impressed by the dedication of the EPA staff to this unique initiative and commended the EPA for its efforts to partner with communities in achieving important long-term and sustainable environmental improvements at the local level. Recommended actions for the CARE Program include: (1) develop and implement a multifaceted information sharing approach; (2) coordinate and refine internal program management activities; and (3) develop a strategic plan and a business plan for CARE

Short-Term International Sport for Development and Peace Programs: A Retrospective Analysis and Critique Informed by Stakeholders’ Perspectives in a Two-Year Follow-Up

Sport for Development and Peace (SDP) programs are a popular approach to promoting positive development throughout the world, spanning health, education, peace, and social issues. However, scholars have identified critical shortcomings of SDP work, including the potential to reinforce neoliberalist tendencies and values imposition from the Global North to the Global South. Deporte y Cambio Social was a short-term SDP program established through partnership between American and Mexican constituent groups with aims to empower girls and women through soccer. Through six semi-structured, two-year retrospective interviews, the purpose of the present study was to explore cross-cultural understandings of power and intercultural power relations from the voices of Mexicans and Americans involved in the program to offer reflective critique of, and generate participant-informed strategies for improving, the design and implementation SDP programs broadly. Using thematic analysis from a critical constructivist orientation, the meanings generated from the data showed that Mexican and American participants similarly defined power and acknowledged power imbalances informed by a limiting project framework and a sociocultural-informed deference to Americans as experts. Strong, positive intercultural experiences between Mexican and American constituent groups were reported amid often unseen social biases that can be experienced abroad and perpetuated in SDP programs. Critical reflexivity, prolonged cultural preparation, longer-term engagement, and careful construction of SDP leadership teams and program participants were among the strategies informed by the data that were further interpreted to account for the complex realities of SDP programs

Descriptive Sets and the Topology of Nonseparable Banach Spaces

This paper was extensively circulated in manuscript form beginning in the Summer of 1989. It is being published here for the first time in its original form except for minor corrections, updated references and some concluding comments

Factories of the future - synthetic biology: a sustainable technology for future textile manufacturing?

It is predicted that by 2050, we will reach a global population of 9.6 billion people (United Nations, 2013) and estimated that the current global population is using 50% more planetary resources than is available (Moore and Rees, 2013; 42). As the second largest polluting industry on the planet, after oil (Deloitte, Danish Fashion Institute, 2013) there is a desperate need for the fashion and textile industry to reduce its ecological impact whilst meeting the demands of a growing population on a finite planet. How can we really move forward and explore new perspectives of sustainable technologically led manufacture in circular biological systems? BIOmatters is a practice-based research project conducted at the University of Brighton exploring whether synthetic biology could become a sustainable technology for future textile manufacturing. BIOmatters investigates the intersection of textile design and synthetic biology to propose future fabrication processes for textiles, exploring what this landscape might look like in industry. It does this through the proposal of theoretical models and speculative design propositions as a means to test assumptions and promote discourse. This paper presents key outcomes from BIOmatters and reflects on the potential of critical and contestable design practice to question through making the opportunities and challenges of a future ‘biotextile’ industry

Biomatters: a new age of biosynthetic-technology for the textile and apparel industry

Biomatters explores how the role of design could change in the textile and apparel industry if synthetic biology is established as a new technology and production method. The field of synthetic biology is an industry developing methods for ‘reprogramming’ cells to produce bespoke materials, medicines and biofuels. There is much rhetoric around designable biology as a world changing and world saving sustainable technology, but there are also a number of questions that surround its claims and ambition that need to be answered (Ginsberg, 2014). Biotech is a fast moving industry that needs to be questioned and scrutinized; design can play a key role here. I feel there is further need to review how design practice will change in my industry, if we start working with life as raw material, machine and operating system (Ginsberg, 2014). This research project explores this emerging industry from the perspective of fashion and textile application in order to seek sustainable solutions, new materials and circular models, to tackle key industry issues. It investigates whether reprogrammed microbes could become our ‘factories of the future’ (Lee, 2005) fostering a new design paradigm based on cultivation, growth and living cells. What it will mean if we begin to ‘biofacture’ (Collet, 2017) materials and apparel. And what the shift from hand-made and man-made to ‘grow-made’ (Collet, 2017) will mean for design practice within my industry

What do we need for robust and quantitative health impact assessment?

Health impact assessment (HIA) aims to make the health consequences of decisions explicit. Decision-makers need to know that the conclusions of HIA are robust. Quantified estimates of potential health impacts may be more influential but there are a number of concerns. First, not everything that can be quantified is important. Second, not everything that is being quantified at present should be, if this cannot be done robustly. Finally, not everything that is important can be quantified; rigorous qualitative HIA will still be needed for a thorough assessment. This paper presents the first published attempt to provide practical guidance on what is required to perform robust, quantitative HIA. Initial steps include profiling the affected populations, obtaining evidence from for postulated impacts, and determining how differences in subgoups' exposures and suscepibilities affect impacts. Using epidemiological evidence for HIA is different from carrying out a new study. Key steps in quantifying impacts are mapping the causal pathway, selecting appropriate outcome measures and selecting or developing a statistical model. Evidence from different sources is needed. For many health impacts, evidence of an effect may be scarce and estimates of the size and nature of the relationship may be inadequate. Assumptions and uncertainties must therefore be explicit. Modelled data can sometimes be tested against empirical data but sensitivity analyses are crucial. When scientific problems occur, discontinuing the study is not an option, as HIA is usually intended to inform real decisions. Both qualitative and quantitative elements of HIA must be performed robustly to be of value