Prioritising targets for biological control of weeds - a decision support tool for policy makers

This report outlines a framework of the overall process of prioritising targets for biological control and includes a decision support tool that enables policy makers to determine whether biological control is a suitable option for a proposed target species.Introduction Establishing effective biological control agents in Australia is costly in both resources and time, yet it is often a valuable component of weed control. It has been estimated that biological control of weeds in Australia has provided around $10 billion worth of agricultural protection over the past century. To date significant investment has been made in the selection process of biocontrol agents and the identification of priority weeds for biocontrol. However there is no nationally agreed system that facilitates prioritisation of weed targets for biological control. The Department of Agriculture commissioned ABARES to develop:• a framework that outlines the overall process of prioritising targets for biological control and• a decision support tool that enables policy makers to determine whether biological control is a suitable option for the proposed target species.A recent work related to the selection and prioritisation of weeds for biological control targets was published by Paynter et al 2009 (hereafter \u27Paynter\u27). Paynter was used as a basis for discussion about how to assist policy makers in assessing whether biocontrol is an appropriate option for weed control.The proposal for a decision support tool for policy makers was discussed at a workshop fully recognising that such a system would need to have a science basis that is both transparent and repeatable to be rigorous. The participants were experts in biocontrol or other weed science, state representatives and other relevant stakeholders. The proposal was outlined in a background/discussion paper and provided to participants prior to the workshop. The purpose of the paper was to provide participants with relevant background information and a proposed approach for a decision support tool for policy makers to be debated and progressed at the workshop.Aim of the workshop and background/discussion paper The workshop was held in Canberra on 4 April 2013. The objectives of the workshop were to:• discuss whether the approach based on Paynter is suitable as a decision support tool at the policy level to prioritise targets for biological control• reach a consensus amongst workshop participants on key principles that need to be considered in the prioritisation process of biological control targetsSuggestions made at the workshop are addressed in this report. Many of the concerns raised at the workshop corresponded with the common \u27core\u27 issues recorded in Paynter. These include concerns about lack of data, the tendency of the framework to overlook weeds outside the Weeds of National Significance, concerns that weightings are arbitrary, and a need for the framework to be able to anticipate emergent weeds and potential future problems. Here, those issues that are relevant to policy have been considered with the acknowledgement that remaining \u27core\u27 issues need to be addressed elsewhere

In Situ X-ray Raman Scattering Spectroscopy of the Formation of Cobalt Carbides in a Co/TiO2 Fischer–Tropsch Synthesis Catalyst

We present in situ experiments to study the possible formation of cobalt carbides during Fischer–Tropsch synthesis (FTS) in a Co/TiO2 catalyst at relevant conditions of pressure and temperature. The experiments were performed by a combination of X-ray Raman scattering (XRS) spectroscopy and X-ray diffraction (XRD). Two different experiments were performed: (1) a Fischer–Tropsch Synthesis (FTS) reaction of an ∼14 wt % Co/TiO2 catalyst at 523 K and 5 bar under H2 lean conditions (i.e., a H2:CO ratio of 0.5) and (2) carburization of pure cobalt (as reference experiment). In both experiments, the Co L3-edge XRS spectra reveal a change in the oxidation state of the cobalt nanoparticles, which we assign to the formation of cobalt carbide (Co2C). The C K edge XRS spectra were used to quantify the formation of different carbon species in both experiments.Peer reviewe

The Epidemiology of Alcohol Use Disorders Cross-Nationally: Findings from the World Mental Health Surveys

Background: Prevalences of Alcohol Use Disorders (AUDs) and Mental Health Disorders (MHDs) in many individual countries have been reported but there are few cross-national studies. The WHO World Mental Health (WMH) Survey Initiative standardizes methodological factors facilitating comparison of the prevalences and associated factors of AUDs in a large number of countries to identify differences and commonalities. Methods: Lifetime and 12-month prevalence estimates of DSM-IV AUDs, MHDs, and associations were assessed in the 29 WMH surveys using the WHO CIDI 3.0. Results: Prevalence estimates of alcohol use and AUD across countries and WHO regions varied widely. Mean lifetime prevalence of alcohol use in all countries combined was 80%, ranging from 3.8% to 97.1%. Combined average population lifetime and 12-month prevalence of AUDs were 8.6% and 2.2% respectively and 10.7% and 4.4% among non-abstainers. Of individuals with a lifetime AUD, 43.9% had at least one lifetime MHD and 17.9% of respondents with a lifetime MHD had a lifetime AUD. For most comorbidity combinations, the MHD preceded the onset of the AUD. AUD prevalence was much higher for men than women. 15% of all lifetime AUD cases developed before age 18. Higher household income and being older at time of interview, married, and more educated, were associated with a lower risk for lifetime AUD and AUD persistence. Conclusions: Prevalence of alcohol use and AUD is high overall, with large variation worldwide. The WMH surveys corroborate the wide geographic consistency of a number of well-documented clinical and epidemiological findings and patterns

Trauma and psychotic experiences:Transnational data from the World Mental Health survey

Background: Traumatic events are associated with increased risk of psychotic experiences, but it is unclear whether this association is explained by mental disorders prior to psychotic experience onset. Aims: To investigate the associations between traumatic events and subsequent psychotic experience onset after adjusting for post-traumatic stress disorder and other mental disorders. Method: We assessed 29 traumatic event types and psychotic experiences from the World Mental Health surveys and examined the associations of traumatic events with subsequent psychotic experience onset with and without adjustments for mental disorders. Results: Respondents with any traumatic events had three times the odds of other respondents of subsequently developing psychotic experiences (OR=3.1, 95% CI 2.7-3.7), with variability in strength of association across traumatic event types. These associations persisted after adjustment for mental disorders. Conclusions: Exposure to traumatic events predicts subsequent onset of psychotic experiences even after adjusting for comorbid mental disorders

results from the World Mental Health Survey Initiative

Purpose: Understanding the effects of war on mental disorders is important for developing effective post-conflict recovery policies and programs. The current study uses cross-sectional, retrospectively reported data collected as part of the World Mental Health (WMH) Survey Initiative to examine the associations of being a civilian in a war zone/region of terror in World War II with a range of DSM-IV mental disorders. Methods: Adults (n = 3370) who lived in countries directly involved in World War II in Europe and Japan were administered structured diagnostic interviews of lifetime DSM-IV mental disorders. The associations of war-related traumas with subsequent disorder onset-persistence were assessed with discrete-time survival analysis (lifetime prevalence) and conditional logistic regression (12-month prevalence). Results: Respondents who were civilians in a war zone/region of terror had higher lifetime risks than other respondents of major depressive disorder (MDD; OR 1.5, 95% CI 1.1, 1.9) and anxiety disorder (OR 1.5, 95% CI 1.1, 2.0). The association of war exposure with MDD was strongest in the early years after the war, whereas the association with anxiety disorders increased over time. Among lifetime cases, war exposure was associated with lower past year risk of anxiety disorders (OR 0.4, 95% CI 0.2, 0.7). Conclusions: Exposure to war in World War II was associated with higher lifetime risk of some mental disorders. Whether comparable patterns will be found among civilians living through more recent wars remains to be seen, but should be recognized as a possibility by those projecting future needs for treatment of mental disorders.publishersversionpublishe

The descriptive epidemiology of DSM-IV Adult ADHD in the World Health Organization World Mental Health Surveys

We previously reported on the cross-national epidemiology of ADHD from the first 10 countries in the WHO World Mental Health (WMH) Surveys. The current report expands those previous findings to the 20 nationally or regionally representative WMH surveys that have now collected data on adult ADHD. The Composite International Diagnostic Interview (CIDI) was administered to 26,744 respondents in these surveys in high-, upper-middle-, and low-/lower-middle-income countries (68.5% mean response rate). Current DSM-IV/CIDI adult ADHD prevalence averaged 2.8% across surveys and was higher in high (3.6%)- and upper-middle (3.0%)- than low-/lower-middle (1.4%)-income countries. Conditional prevalence of current ADHD averaged 57.0% among childhood cases and 41.1% among childhood subthreshold cases. Adult ADHD was significantly related to being male, previously married, and low education. Adult ADHD was highly comorbid with DSM-IV/CIDI anxiety, mood, behavior, and substance disorders and significantly associated with role impairments (days out of role, impaired cognition, and social interactions) when controlling for comorbidities. Treatment seeking was low in all countries and targeted largely to comorbid conditions rather than to ADHD. These results show that adult ADHD is prevalent, seriously impairing, and highly comorbid but vastly under-recognized and undertreated across countries and cultures

Global, regional, and national life expectancy, all-cause mortality, and cause-specific mortality for 249 causes of death, 1980-2015 : a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2015

Background Improving survival and extending the longevity of life for all populations requires timely, robust evidence on local mortality levels and trends. The Global Burden of Disease 2015 Study (GBD 2015) provides a comprehensive assessment of all-cause and cause-specific mortality for 249 causes in 195 countries and territories from 1980 to 2015. These results informed an in-depth investigation of observed and expected mortality patterns based on sociodemographic measures. Methods We estimated all-cause mortality by age, sex, geography, and year using an improved analytical approach originally developed for GBD 2013 and GBD 2010. Improvements included refinements to the estimation of child and adult mortality and corresponding uncertainty, parameter selection for under-5 mortality synthesis by spatiotemporal Gaussian process regression, and sibling history data processing. We also expanded the database of vital registration, survey, and census data to 14 294 geography-year datapoints. For GBD 2015, eight causes, including Ebola virus disease, were added to the previous GBD cause list for mortality. We used six modelling approaches to assess cause-specific mortality, with the Cause of Death Ensemble Model (CODEm) generating estimates for most causes. We used a series of novel analyses to systematically quantify the drivers of trends in mortality across geographies. First, we assessed observed and expected levels and trends of cause-specific mortality as they relate to the Socio-demographic Index (SDI), a summary indicator derived from measures of income per capita, educational attainment, and fertility. Second, we examined factors affecting total mortality patterns through a series of counterfactual scenarios, testing the magnitude by which population growth, population age structures, and epidemiological changes contributed to shifts in mortality. Finally, we attributed changes in life expectancy to changes in cause of death. We documented each step of the GBD 2015 estimation processes, as well as data sources, in accordance with Guidelines for Accurate and Transparent Health Estimates Reporting (GATHER). Findings Globally, life expectancy from birth increased from 61.7 years (95% uncertainty interval 61.4-61.9) in 1980 to 71.8 years (71.5-72.2) in 2015. Several countries in sub-Saharan Africa had very large gains in life expectancy from 2005 to 2015, rebounding from an era of exceedingly high loss of life due to HIV/AIDS. At the same time, many geographies saw life expectancy stagnate or decline, particularly for men and in countries with rising mortality from war or interpersonal violence. From 2005 to 2015, male life expectancy in Syria dropped by 11.3 years (3.7-17.4), to 62.6 years (56.5-70.2). Total deaths increased by 4.1% (2.6-5.6) from 2005 to 2015, rising to 55.8 million (54.9 million to 56.6 million) in 2015, but age-standardised death rates fell by 17.0% (15.8-18.1) during this time, underscoring changes in population growth and shifts in global age structures. The result was similar for non-communicable diseases (NCDs), with total deaths from these causes increasing by 14.1% (12.6-16.0) to 39.8 million (39.2 million to 40.5 million) in 2015, whereas age-standardised rates decreased by 13.1% (11.9-14.3). Globally, this mortality pattern emerged for several NCDs, including several types of cancer, ischaemic heart disease, cirrhosis, and Alzheimer's disease and other dementias. By contrast, both total deaths and age-standardised death rates due to communicable, maternal, neonatal, and nutritional conditions significantly declined from 2005 to 2015, gains largely attributable to decreases in mortality rates due to HIV/AIDS (42.1%, 39.1-44.6), malaria (43.1%, 34.7-51.8), neonatal preterm birth complications (29.8%, 24.8-34.9), and maternal disorders (29.1%, 19.3-37.1). Progress was slower for several causes, such as lower respiratory infections and nutritional deficiencies, whereas deaths increased for others, including dengue and drug use disorders. Age-standardised death rates due to injuries significantly declined from 2005 to 2015, yet interpersonal violence and war claimed increasingly more lives in some regions, particularly in the Middle East. In 2015, rotaviral enteritis (rotavirus) was the leading cause of under-5 deaths due to diarrhoea (146 000 deaths, 118 000-183 000) and pneumococcal pneumonia was the leading cause of under-5 deaths due to lower respiratory infections (393 000 deaths, 228 000-532 000), although pathogen-specific mortality varied by region. Globally, the effects of population growth, ageing, and changes in age-standardised death rates substantially differed by cause. Our analyses on the expected associations between cause-specific mortality and SDI show the regular shifts in cause of death composition and population age structure with rising SDI. Country patterns of premature mortality (measured as years of life lost [YLLs]) and how they differ from the level expected on the basis of SDI alone revealed distinct but highly heterogeneous patterns by region and country or territory. Ischaemic heart disease, stroke, and diabetes were among the leading causes of YLLs in most regions, but in many cases, intraregional results sharply diverged for ratios of observed and expected YLLs based on SDI. Communicable, maternal, neonatal, and nutritional diseases caused the most YLLs throughout sub-Saharan Africa, with observed YLLs far exceeding expected YLLs for countries in which malaria or HIV/AIDS remained the leading causes of early death. Interpretation At the global scale, age-specific mortality has steadily improved over the past 35 years; this pattern of general progress continued in the past decade. Progress has been faster in most countries than expected on the basis of development measured by the SDI. Against this background of progress, some countries have seen falls in life expectancy, and age-standardised death rates for some causes are increasing. Despite progress in reducing age-standardised death rates, population growth and ageing mean that the number of deaths from most non-communicable causes are increasing in most countries, putting increased demands on health systems. Copyright (C) The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd.Peer reviewe

The associations between pre-existing mental disorders and subsequent onset of chronic headaches: A worldwide epidemiological perspective

Although there is a significant association between pre-existing depression and later onset of chronic headache, the extent to which other pre-existing mental disorders are associated with subsequent onset of headache in the general population is not known. Also unknown is the extent to which these associations vary by gender or by life course. We report global data from the WHO's World Mental Health surveys (N=52,095), in which, by means of the Composite International Diagnostic Interview-3.0 (CIDI-3.0), 16 DSM-IV mental disorders were retrospectively assessed in terms of lifetime prevalence and age-of-onset. Frequent or severe headaches were assessed using self-reports. After adjustment for covariates, survival models showed a moderate but consistent association between pre-existing mood (ORs 1.3-1.4), anxiety (ORs 1.2-1.7), and impulse-control disorders (ORs 1.7-1.9) and the subsequent onset of headache. We also found a dose-response relationship between the number of pre-existing mental disorders and subsequent headache onset (OR ranging between 1.9 for 1 up to 3.4 for 5+ pre-existing mental disorders). Our findings suggest a consistent and pervasive relationship between a wide range of pre-existing mental disorders and the subsequent onset of headaches. This highlights the importance of assessing a broad range of mental disorders, not just depression, as specific risk factors for the subsequent onset of frequent or severe headaches.status: publishe

The associations between preexisting mental disorders and subsequent onset of chronic headaches: A worldwide epidemiologic perspective

Although there is a significant association between preexisting depression and later onset of chronic headache, the extent to which other preexisting mental disorders are associated with subsequent onset of headache in the general population is not known. Also unknown is the extent to which these associations vary by gender or by life course. We report global data from the WHO's World Mental Health surveys (n = 52,095), in which, by means of the Composite International Diagnostic Interview-3.0, 16 mental disorders from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition, were retrospectively assessed in terms of lifetime prevalence and age of onset. Frequent or severe headaches were assessed using self-reports. After adjustment for covariates, survival models showed a moderate but consistent association between preexisting mood (odds ratios [ORs] = 1.3-1.4), anxiety (ORs = 1.2-1.7), and impulse-control disorders (ORs = 1.7-1.9) and the subsequent onset of headache. We also found a dose-response relationship between the number of preexisting mental disorders and subsequent headache onset (OR ranging from 1.9 for 1 preexisting mental disorder to 3.4 for ≥5 preexisting mental disorders). Our findings suggest a consistent and pervasive relationship between a wide range of preexisting mental disorders and the subsequent onset of headaches. This highlights the importance of assessing a broad range of mental disorders, not just depression, as specific risk factors for the subsequent onset of frequent or severe headaches. Perspective This study shows that there is a temporal association between a broad range of preexisting mental disorders and the subsequent onset of severe or frequent headaches in general population samples across the world

Cross-national Epidemiology of Panic Disorder and Panic Attacks in the World Mental Health Surveys

The scarcity of cross-national reports and the changes in Diagnostic and Statistical Manual version 5 (DSM-5) regarding panic disorder (PD) and panic attacks (PAs) call for new epidemiological data on PD and PAs and its subtypes in the general population.status: publishe