The Legal and Socio-Political Context of Urban Sustainability: Experiences from Greece

The aim of this paper is to outline the main legal and socio-political aspects relating to urban sustainability in Greece. This research focuses on the state of play of urban sustainability, as well as on the challenges relating to its implementation, based on an interdisciplinary approach, addressing legal, socio-political, and technical issues. Within this framework, emphasis is placed on Greece, a country that suffered through a long and severe economic crisis, whereby socio-spatial effects harmed a wide range of social groups. In this context, the paper focuses on the normative, jurisprudential, and policy reforms that took place due to and during the economic crisis,with respect to urban planning and land use. Moreover, it sheds light on smart city technologies, which ought to serve people’s needs,especially those in vulnerable social groups,and it emphasises sustainable development, which at risk of being overstretched during an economic crisis. Finally, the paper also analyses the interrelation between urban sustainability and resilience, in the context of the natural disasters that affected Greece. By focusing our research on a southern European country that suffered through a long and painful socio-economic crisis, while also being prone to natural disasters, this research aspires to create a forum for dialogue with other countries facing similar legal and social challenges, and, hence, to engage in a comparative analysis that will help academics and policy makers take a step forward in the examination and implementation of urban sustainability, resilience, and smartness. Keywords: urban sustainability, sustainable development law, human rights cities, urban planning,resilient cities, natural disasters DOI: 10.7176/JLPG/95-09 Publication date:March 31st 202

Serum Lipid Profile Constituents as Markers of Cardiovascular Morbidity in Patients on Chronic Hemodialysis

We designed the present case-control study in order to examine the validity of apolipoprotein (apo) A-I, B, apoB/apoA-I ratio and Lp(a) as alternative markers of cardiovascular morbidity in end-stage renal disease (ESRD) patients undergoing chronic hemodialysis (HD). Twenty-five HD patients (18 males, mean age 63, range 52–69 years) comprised the group with prevalent cardiovascular disease (CVD) and 50 HD patients (35 males, mean age 62, range 40–77 years) with non evident cardiovascular disease history constituted the second study group. Patients with CVD had significantly higher concentrations of serum apoB, apoB/apoA-I ratio and Lp(a), and lower levels of apoA-I compared to patients without incident CVD. All three parameters studied were correlated with cardiovascular morbidity, i.e. apoA-I negatively and apoB and apoB/apoA-I ratio positively (r = −0.6, P < 0.05; r = 0.659, P < 0.01; and r = 0.614, P < 0.01, respectively). Furthermore, logCRP exhibited as well a significant positive correlation with cardiovascular morbidity (r = 0.704, P < 0.001), not this being the case for Lp(a) which was not found to exhibit such a correlation (r = 0.05, P = NS). Among them, apoB and apoB/apoA-I ratio exhibited the characteristics most coherent to CVD. The age- and sex-adjusted OR for the presence of CVD was 2.3 and 2.0, respectively, which remained independent of any confounding effect of inflammation. In conclusion, serum apoB levels and apoB/apoA-I ratio exhibit characteristics of credible independent markers of in HD patients

Grèce : L'indemnisation des servitudes d'urbanisme

Koutoupa-Rengakos Evangelia. Grèce : L'indemnisation des servitudes d'urbanisme. In: Droit et Ville, tome 48, 1999. Colloque international : L'indemnisation des servitudes d'urbanisme en Europe (Toulouse, 15-16 octobre 1999). Première partie : Rapports internationaux. pp. 189-206