Revisiting the Regulation Debate: The Effect of Food Marketing on Childhood Obesity

[Excerpt] “Despite the widespread concern regarding childhood obesity, there is broad divergence of opinion regarding responsibility for the crisis. Whether the government, food industry, or parents are accountable has become the focus of much debate. Public health groups have attempted various strategies to confront childhood obesity, such as litigation, legislation, and government regulation. While many researchers and advocates agree that government should play an affirmative role with respect to childhood obesity, they are very much divided over what that role should be. For example, although none of these acts has become law, eighty-six bills have been proposed regarding obesity since the 106th Congress. Thirteen bills in the 109th Congress dealt specifically with childhood obesity. Although some urge the government to inform the public about healthy eating and healthy activities, they also argue that governmental action going beyond informational and educational functions would be too oppressive. Many advocates call for government oversight more robust than merely mandating calorie disclosures at fast-food restaurants, labels on grocery products, and nutrition education in public schools.

Reforming Victorian Sense/Abilities: Disabilities in Elizabeth Gaskell’s Social Problem Novels

This dissertation rewrites the representations of disability, impairment, and illness throughout Elizabeth Gaskell’s fiction. The project’s four chapters examine blindness in Mary Barton, pregnancy, deformity, and typhus fever in Ruth, tuberculosis and hysteria in North and South, and hysteria and disfigurement in Sylvia’s Lovers, in order to intervene with disability in its literary, historical, medical, and social contexts by uniting methodologies ranging from Disability Studies, Medical Humanities, feminist theory, and Victorian studies. By looking at the novel and rethinking it through Disability Studies, this dissertation joins contemporary theory with historical context, refreshing scholarly attention toward under-represented bodies and minds. This dissertation is the first extensive examination of how Disability Studies transforms our understanding of Gaskell’s fiction. Her novels challenge us to look generously at our definitions of disability through character description, sensory narration, and narrative development. This dissertation examines how Gaskell’s unique representations of disabled characters blur the lines between melodrama and realism, precisely to make visible alternative modes of identity, experience, and embodiment. I locate the important value of ethics as a central component of Gaskell’s novels. As an effective practitioner of social justice, Elizabeth Gaskell uses her novels as a space to explain and articulate to her readers the value of diverse representation. Subsequently, ambiguity is a central point of Gaskell’s fiction, and makes her work especially important to Disability Studies. I demonstrate how Gaskell’s novels allow for a broader consideration of disability to take shape. In this way, disability becomes a more describable and complex condition. By using Disability Studies as the central my central theoretical approach to Elizabeth Gaskell’s fiction, this dissertation creates a space for critics to discuss the range and depth of Gaskell’s fiction and understand her inclusion of disabled characters. It consists of four primary chapters, detailing the representations of disability at play in the fiction and life writing of Elizabeth Gaskell and some of the most famous Victorian writers, like Charlotte Bronte. The project is preceded by an introduction which roots disability in mid-nineteenth-century narratives and establishes the Disability Studies methodology I employ in each chapter

Driving innovation in sustainability through product Life Cycle Assessments

Watson-Marlow Fluid Technology Group is committed to improving the sustainability of our products. Customer expectations are growing in relation to the sustainability performance of our products and services and many are looking to us to help them meet their sustainability targets. Therefore delivering products and services that improve the sustainability of our customers’ operations is central to our Company Purpose. One of the pillars of our Sustainability strategy is a commitment to carrying out life cycle assessments (LCA) for our products. LCAs are critical to understanding the environmental impact of a product, from raw material extraction through to product disposal and beyond considering end of life solutions. In collaboration with the University of Exeter, an approach to conducting robust LCAs has been established focusing on Cradle to Grave and End Of Life impacts. To date, products integral to the use of Watson-Marlow’s puresu® and aspecticsuTM single-use technologies have been assessed including the BioClamp® and Aflex Hose products as well as the Qdos 30 pump for industrial applications. The outputs of the LCAs are enabling Watson-Marlow to develop and deploy innovation in sustainability throughout their supply chain and in their product development pipeline

A Clinical Prediction Score to Guide Referral of Elderly Dialysis Patients for Kidney Transplant Evaluation.

IntroductionDialysis patients aged ≥70 years derive improved life expectancy through kidney transplantation compared to their waitlisted counterparts, but guidelines are not clear about how to identify appropriate transplantation candidates. We developed a clinical prediction score to identify elderly dialysis patients with expected 5-year survival appropriate for kidney transplantation (>5 years).MethodsIncident dialysis patients in 2006-2009 aged ≥70 were identified from the United States Renal Data System database and divided into derivation and validation cohorts. Using the derivation cohort, candidate variables with a significant crude association with 5-year all-cause mortality were included in a multivariable logistic regression model to generate a scoring system. The scoring system was tested in the validation cohort and a cohort of elderly transplant recipients.ResultsCharacteristics most predictive of 5-year mortality included age >80, body mass index (BMI) <18, the presence of congestive heart failure (CHF), chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), immobility, and being institutionalized. Factors associated with increased 5-year survival were non-white race, a primary cause of end stage renal disease (ESRD) other than diabetes, employment within 6 months of dialysis initiation, and dialysis start via arteriovenous fistula (AVF). 5-year mortality was 47% for the lowest risk score group (3.6% of the validation cohort) and >90% for the highest risk cohort (42% of the validation cohort).ConclusionThis clinical prediction score could be useful for physicians to identify potentially suitable candidates for kidney transplantation

Does Gender Raise the Ethical Bar? Exploring the Punishment of Ethical Violations at Work

We investigate whether women are targets of more severe punishment than men following ethical violations at work. Using a large sample of working adults, Study 1 finds that ethical behavior is more strongly prescribed for women than for men. Women face intensified ethical prescriptions, relative to a gender-neutral person. Study 2 experimentally tests whether women are punished more severely than men. Study 2 also tests the scope of our theory by asking whether women are punished more for errors in general, or only for ethical violations. Study 3 examines our effect in the field by examining how severely attorneys are punished for violating the American Bar Association’s ethical rules. Female attorneys are punished more severely than male attorneys, after accounting for a variety of factors. Study 3 also provides evidence that the gender make-up of the decision-making group that allots punishment serves to moderate the extent of discriminatory punishments. When a larger percentage of women sat on the judges’ panels overseeing attorney disciplinary hearings, disparities in allotted punishment between men and women were smaller. Our research documents a new prescriptive stereotype faced by women and helps to explain gender disparities in organizations. It highlights punishment severity as a novel mechanism by which institutions derail women’s careers more than men’s