Men's passage to fatherhood: an analysis of the contemporary relevance of transition theory

This paper presents a theoretical analysis of men's experiences of pregnancy, birth and early fatherhood. It does so using a framework of ritual transition theory and argues that despite its earlier structural-functionalist roots, transition theory remains a valuable framework, illuminating contemporary transitions across the life course. The paper discusses the historical development of transition or ritual theory and, drawing upon data generated during longitudinal ethnographic interviews with men undergoing the transition to fatherhood, analyses its relevance in understanding contemporary experiences of fatherhood

Role of Position 627 of PB2 and the Multibasic Cleavage Site of the Hemagglutinin in the Virulence of H5N1 Avian Influenza Virus in Chickens and Ducks

Highly pathogenic H5N1 avian influenza viruses have caused major disease outbreaks in domestic and free-living birds with transmission to humans resulting in 59% mortality amongst 564 cases. The mutation of the amino acid at position 627 of the viral polymerase basic-2 protein (PB2) from glutamic acid (E) in avian isolates to lysine (K) in human isolates is frequently found, but it is not known if this change affects the fitness and pathogenicity of the virus in birds. We show here that horizontal transmission of A/Vietnam/1203/2004 H5N1 (VN/1203) virus in chickens and ducks was not affected by the change of K to E at PB2-627. All chickens died between 21 to 48 hours post infection (pi), while 70% of the ducks survived infection. Virus replication was detected in chickens within 12 hours pi and reached peak titers in spleen, lung and brain between 18 to 24 hours for both viruses. Viral antigen in chickens was predominantly in the endothelium, while in ducks it was present in multiple cell types, including neurons, myocardium, skeletal muscle and connective tissues. Virus replicated to a high titer in chicken thrombocytes and caused upregulation of TLR3 and several cell adhesion molecules, which may explain the rapid virus dissemination and location of viral antigen in endothelium. Virus replication in ducks reached peak values between 2 and 4 days pi in spleen, lung and brain tissues and in contrast to infection in chickens, thrombocytes were not involved. In addition, infection of chickens with low pathogenic VN/1203 caused neuropathology, with E at position PB2-627 causing significantly higher infection rates than K, indicating that it enhances virulence in chickens

A Randomized Controlled Trial Comparing the Effects of Counseling and Alarm Device on HAART Adherence and Virologic Outcomes

Michael Chung and colleagues show that intensive early adherence counseling at HAART initiation resulted in sustained, significant impact on adherence and virologic treatment failure, whereas use of an alarm device had no effect

Divorce, divorce rates, and professional care seeking for mental health problems in Europe: a cross-sectional population-based study

Background: Little is known about differences in professional care seeking based on marital status. The few existing studies show more professional care seeking among the divorced or separated compared to the married or cohabiting. The aim of this study is to determine whether, in a sample of the European general population, the divorced or separated seek more professional mental health care than the married or cohabiting, regardless of self-reported mental health problems. Furthermore, we examine whether two country-level features-the supply of mental health professionals and the country-level divorce rates-contribute to marital status differences in professional care-seeking behavior. Methods: We use data from the Eurobarometer 248 on mental well-being that was collected via telephone interviews. The unweighted sample includes 27,146 respondents (11,728 men and 15,418 women). Poisson hierarchical regression models were estimated to examine whether the divorced or separated have higher professional health care use for emotional or psychological problems, after controlling for mental and somatic health, sociodemographic characteristics, support from family and friends, and degree of urbanization. We also considered country-level divorce rates and indicators of the supply of mental health professionals, and applied design and population weights. Results: We find that professional care seeking is strongly need based. Moreover, the divorced or separated consult health professionals for mental health problems more often than people who are married or who cohabit do. In addition, we find that the gap between the divorced or separated and the married or cohabiting is highest in countries with low divorce rates. Conclusions: The higher rates of professional care seeking for mental health problems among the divorced or separated only partially correlates with their more severe mental health problems. In countries where marital dissolution is more common, the marital status gap in professional care seeking is narrower, partially because professional care seeking is more common among the married or cohabiting

Automated analysis of phylogenetic clusters

BACKGROUND: As sequence data sets used for the investigation of pathogen transmission patterns increase in size, automated tools and standardized methods for cluster analysis have become necessary. We have developed an automated Cluster Picker which identifies monophyletic clades meeting user-input criteria for bootstrap support and maximum genetic distance within large phylogenetic trees. A second tool, the Cluster Matcher, automates the process of linking genetic data to epidemiological or clinical data, and matches clusters between runs of the Cluster Picker. RESULTS: We explore the effect of different bootstrap and genetic distance thresholds on clusters identified in a data set of publicly available HIV sequences, and compare these results to those of a previously published tool for cluster identification. To demonstrate their utility, we then use the Cluster Picker and Cluster Matcher together to investigate how clusters in the data set changed over time. We find that clusters containing sequences from more than one UK location at the first time point (multiple origin) were significantly more likely to grow than those representing only a single location. CONCLUSIONS: The Cluster Picker and Cluster Matcher can rapidly process phylogenetic trees containing tens of thousands of sequences. Together these tools will facilitate comparisons of pathogen transmission dynamics between studies and countries

High prevalence and diversity of HIV-1 non-B genetic forms due to immigration in southern Spain: A phylogeographic approach

Phylogenetic studies are a valuable tool to understand viral transmission patterns and the role of immigration in HIV-1 spread. We analyzed the spatio-temporal relationship of different HIV-1 non-B subtype variants over time using phylogenetic analysis techniques. We collected 693 pol (PR+RT) sequences that were sampled from 2005 to 2012 from naïve patients in different hospitals in southern Spain. We used REGA v3.0 to classify them into subtypes and recombinant forms, which were confirmed by phylogenetic analysis through maximum likelihood (ML) using RAxML. For the main HIV-1 non-B variants, publicly available, genetically similar sequences were sought using HIV-BLAST. The presence of HIV-1 lineages circulating in our study population was established using ML and Bayesian inference (BEAST v1.7.5) and transmission networks were identified. We detected 165 (23.4%) patients infected with HIV-1 non-B variants: 104 (63%) with recombinant viruses in pol: CRF02_AG (71, 43%), CRF14_BG (8, 4.8%), CRF06_cpx (5, 3%) and nine other recombinant forms (11, 6.7%) and unique recombinants (9, 5.5%). The rest (61, 37%) were infected with non-recombinant subtypes: A1 (30, 18.2%), C (7, [4.2%]), D (3, [1.8%]), F1 (9, 5.5%) and G (12, 7.3%). Most patients infected with HIV-1 non-B variants were men (63%, p < 0.001) aged over 35 (73.5%, p < 0.001), heterosexuals (92.2%, p < 0.001), from Africa (59.5%, p < 0.001) and living in the El Ejido area (62.4%, p<0.001). We found lineages of epidemiological relevance (mainly within Subtype A1), imported primarily through female sex workers from East Europe. We detected 11 transmission clusters of HIV-1 non-B Subtypes, which included patients born in Spain in half of them. We present the phylogenetic profiles of the HIV-1 non-B variants detected in southern Spain, and explore their putative geographical origins. Our data reveals a high HIV-1 genetic diversity likely due to the import of viral lineages that circulate in other countries. The highly immigrated El Ejido area acts as a gateway through which different subtypes are introduced into other regions, hence the importance of setting up epidemiological control measures to prevent future outbreaks