Influence on sensitivity to insecticides: a case study of a settled area and a game park in Liwonde

The close proximity of Liwonde National Park to Liwonde town creates a unique situation of a large human population adjacent to a natural undisturbed animal reserve. The closeness of the two ecosystems has an impact on biology of mosquitoes of the area, such as susceptibility to insecticides. Susceptibility to insecticide was determined using knockdownbioassays. The mosquito, Anopheles gambiae, was exposed to 0.05% deltamethrin and 0.75 % permethrin giving LT 50 and LT 90. The LT50 values for A. gambiae from the town was 17.23 minutes and those from the park, 14.7 minutes (p< 0.05). The calculated LT 90 values were 32.8 and 28.3minutes respectively. These results suggest that human settlements using insecticides in mosquito control reduce susceptibility of mosquitoes to regularly used insecticides such as deltamethrin and permethrin in this study

Malaria Laboratory Diagnostic Performance: Case studies of two health centers in Zomba, Malawi

The objective of the study was to establish the performance of malaria laboratory diagnostics in routine clinical setting of health facilities in Zomba, Malawi. 246 suspected malaria cases in Matawale and Domasi Health Centers in October-November 2009 and 2010 were tested using two diagnostics methods(rapid diagnostic test ( RDT )and Microscopy 144 patients who reported fever in 2009, 52% were referred to the laboratory for malaria test. The positive predictive value for microscopy in this study was 0.86. The study revealed that microscopy missed (30%) and (28%) in 2009 and 2010 respectively and this attributed to challenges with microscopy. RDT missed only 2 of malaria cases results between the two tests performed in the study among the microscopy positives. Microscopy had a lower sensitivity of 70% while Paracheck PfHRP-2 rapid test 91.3%. In conclusion, microscopy produced a low sensitivity when compared to rapid diagnostic test

Détention provisoire des jeunes femmes accusées d’avortement clandestin ou d’infanticide au Sénégal

Introduction: L&#8217;activit&#233; sexuelle chez les jeunes les expose &#224; un accroissement du risque de contracter des grossesses non d&#233;sir&#233;es. Le recours &#224; l&#8217;avortement clandestin avec son corollaire de complications peut entrainer le d&#233;c&#232;s de la jeune femme. Avortement et infanticide sont interdits et sanctionn&#233;s par la loi s&#233;n&#233;galaise. Comment ces jeunes femmes vivent-elles leur d&#233;tention ? Existe-il des alternatives &#224; la d&#233;tention pour &#233;viter leur d&#233;socialisation ? M&#233;thodes: Cette &#233;tude r&#233;trospective portait sur la maison d&#8217;arr&#234;t des femmes de Dakar situ&#233;e &#224; Libert&#233; 6, un quartier de Dakar. Nous avons proc&#233;d&#233; &#224; des entretiens avec des femmes d&#233;tenues &#224; la maison d&#8217;arr&#234;t des femmes de Dakar et suspect&#233;es d&#8217;infanticide ou d&#8217;avortement clandestin. R&#233;sultats: Les femmes de notre &#233;chantillon ont une moyenne d&#8217;&#226;ge inf&#233;rieure &#224; 25 ans avec parmi elles une fille mineure de 16 ans. Nous avons trouv&#233; 18,51% de femmes suspect&#233;es d&#8217;infanticide ou d&#8217;avortement. Dans notre &#233;tude 50% des femmes sont originaires de la p&#233;riph&#233;rie et de la banlieue de Dakar et presque 44% proviennent des autres r&#233;gions du pays. La dur&#233;e moyenne de d&#233;tention provisoire est de neuf mois. Conclusion: Malgr&#233; leur qualification distincte dans le code p&#233;nal : l&#8217;infanticide est un crime et l&#8217;avortement un d&#233;lit, les femmes suspect&#233;es d&#8217;avoir commis ces actes sont soumises &#224; de longues d&#233;tentions pr&#233;ventives. Pan African Medical Journal 2012; 12:4

Variation in the Performance of Larvae Capturing Traps/Substrate during Larviciding on Domasi River in Zomba, Malawi

Research was carried out on performance of larvae capturing traps during larviciding on Domasi River in Zomba. The study was aimed at assessing the impact of Bacillus thuringiensis israelensis (Bti) on black fly larvae colonization of different traps/substrates. Data on black fly larval density on the substrates were collected before and after Bti application. The monitoring was done using three different types of substrates: nylon strips, rocks and debris. The river was divided into three strata and breeding sites were determined

A Complexification of Rolle’s Theorem

A new version of the classical Rolle’s theorem is proved for any complex-valued differentiable function of the complex variable on an open connected convex subset of the complex field. The associated Mean-Value theorem follows naturally. A few explicit illustrative examples are provided in the closing section of the paper

Alexis De Tocqueville et le problème de l'égalité démocratique

Thèse en cotutelle : Université Laval, Québec, Canada, Philosophiae Doctor (Ph. D.) et Institut Catholique de Toulouse, Toulouse, France, Docteur (Dr).Cette présente étude vise à analyser la principale préoccupation de Tocqueville dans De la Démocratie en Amérique : Celle de la possibilité de l’existence d’une société égalitaire qui prend en compte les problèmes susceptibles de la miner. Nous mettons en avant les prérequis pour l’existence d’une société égalitaire et libérale dépassionnée. Ces prérequis se concentrent sur l’exercice de la liberté politique, la participation politique, la citoyenneté active, le rôle des associations et la nécessité du religieux. Comme nous le démontrons dans le développement de notre thèse, si la modernité démocratique autour de Tocqueville s’est focalisée sur l’exaltation du sujet, son objectif à lui c’est d’instruire l’avenir. Il cherche à prévenir les sociétés démocratiques des dangers que la passion de l’égalité fait naître. L’égalité a rapproché les hommes certes, mais elle a entrainé une atrophie de la liberté ainsi qu’une dévaluation du vivre ensemble démocratique. Nous réfléchissons donc sur la manière de concevoir les limites de l’égalité démocratique en tenant compte de la liberté.The aim of this study is to analyse the main issue in Alexis de Tocqueville’s essay, De la Démocratie en Amérique. That is, the possibility to see arise an egalitarian society being able to deal with the issues that might affect it. We state that they are unbiased prerequisites that enable the existence of a liberal and an egalitarian society. Those prerequisites are as followed : (1) concentrated on the exercise of political freedom, (2) the political participation, (3) the active acting of citizenship, (4) the role of civil society through associations or organizations and (5) the religious neccesity. We argue that if democratic modernity around de Tocqueville was focused on elating the subject, his main purpose is to instruct the future. He is seeking to prevent democratic societies from the dangers that the passion of equality enables. So far, it is true that the notion of equality has helped human beings to be closer to each others, yet it has also triggered an atrophy of freedom, as well as a devaluation of the democratic togetherness (in the sense of living together in an era of democraty). We are therefore addressing in this thesis a way of conceiving the limitations of democratic equality in a context of freedom

Projection-invariants, Gram-Schmidt operators, and wavelets

We introduce some projection-invariants for a normalized sequence in a Hilbert space, based on the smallness of the mutual projections of its elements. We then establish conditions to have the original sequence equivalent to its Gram-Schmidt orthonormalization. In many problems of wavelet-decomposition and reconstruction, the use of orthogonal bases cannot be implemented in the construction of certain filters and other practical features. Then, a quasiorthonormal structure for representation may be the next best alternative by achieving new constraints while we can still arbitrarily approximate the powerful classical orthogonal results

The Impact of Bacillus Thuringiensis Israelensis (Bti) on Adult and Larvae Black Fly Populations

In the year 2007, the Ministry of Health (MoH) initiated a larviciding program using Bacillus thuringiensis israelensis (Bti) to mitigate the effects of black fly bites. This study was aimed at assessing the impact of Bti on adult and larvae black fly populations. Baseline data was collected prior to Bti application and after application Larva monitoring was done using four different substrates: nylon strips, rocks, and debri. Adult monitoring was carried out by human landing catches. Data analysis included descriptive summaries, t-tests, regression and Analysis of Variance (ANOVA). The analysis also included the assessment of the effect of Bti on adult flies and Larva density on substrates. All the statistical analysis were done at 5% significance level. The results showed statistically significant differences (p &lt;0.001) in populations of black fly before and after Bti application. Larva density was higher before Bti application and adult numbers were also high in that period. After Bti application a decrease in larva density was recorded and this associated with a gradual decrease in adult numbers. Bti had an impact on the larval population in that a decrease in larva population due to larviciding resulted in the decrease of adult population