Understanding the physical and social environmental determinants of road traffic injury in South Africa

Abstract Road traffic injuries (RTIs) are a major public health challenge, accounting for significant injury, economic and psycho-social burden to societies across the world. While decreases are projected for many high-income countries (HICs) over the next decade or so, staggering increases in the burden of mortality and morbidity are forecast for low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). The unique contextual influences on RTIs in LMICs are, however, not well understood. Conceptual frameworks applied mostly to HICs also do not provide adequate recognition of the unique contextual influences of LMICs. Accordingly, the research in this thesis adopts a predominantly geographical approach to incorporate a large range of physical and social environmental effects, and which are aggregated at different spatial and spatial-temporal scales to understand the contextual influences to road traffic injuries (RTIs) in the South African (S.A) setting. In this regard, four studies are presented; these include: a geographical epidemiology and risk analysis at the district council level and for time, space and population aggregations; an integrated spatialtemporal analysis at the province-week level; a fine-scale geographical analysis at the police area level; and a small area analysis at the suburb level for the city of Durban. In addition to important effects relating to alcohol and travel exposure, findings have shown most environmental influences on RTIs in S.A to be development-related, including effects relating to social and area deprivation, violence and crime, and rurality. With the exception of rurality, the above effects showed a positive association with the occurrence of RTIs in S.A. The findings have implications for alignment and possible integration of road safety policies and practices with other developmental policies in the country. In addition, this research has shown that geographical approaches may provide a useful analytical framework for understanding the complexity and interacting influences within broader systems-based approaches; and especially those of the contextual environment that are particularly relevant for LMIC settings

Urban density, deprivation and road safety: A small area study in the eThekwini metropolitan area, South Africa

Following a general paucity of small area research on road traffic injuries (RTIs), this study examined small area variations in RTIs for the eThekwini Metropolitan Area (comprising predominantly the City of Durban) in South Africa. Population density was used as an organising framework to examine variations in RTI outcomes, and correspondence with a range of measures relating to characteristics of the crashes and to socio-economic deprivation. Analyses were undertaken at the suburb level, using data from 2005–2009 and employing a cross-sectional geographical design. Analyses were also undertaken for disaggregated injury, crash severity, and road user groups. The distribution of the injury outcome measures corresponded with several measures that proxied risks relating to excessive driving speeds, excessive travel exposure, and general social as well as area level deprivation. Negative binomial models, fitted for the injury outcome measures, showed population density to be a significant predictor of all injury outcomes but also that its effects was only partially explained by the explanatory measures considered. The findings on deprivation provide new insights to rural-urban variations in RTIs, at least in the South African setting. The findings also have implications for informing integrated developmental policies and strategies across a range of disciplines and departments, especially at the city level.Keywords: road traffic injury, small area, Durban, population density, densification, deprivatio

Zero-tolerance drink-driving and road safety in South Africa: What are the options?

Alcohol is a major contributing factor to the burden of road traffic crashes and injuries in South Africa. There has been an increase in political interest and engagement on the issue of drink-driving in recent months following government restrictions on the sale and public consumption of alcohol during the COVID-19 lockdowns along with proposed zero-tolerance drink-driving legislation. In this paper, we critically examine global research and experiences with the adoption of zero-tolerance approaches to drink-driving along with key South African contextual considerations to provide evidence-based and contextually relevant recommendations for advancing zero-tolerance drink-driving legislation in the country. There is significant evidence to support the adoption of zero-tolerance legislation but at a blood alcohol concentration (BAC) threshold limit for the general driving population set at 0.02 g/100 mL (rather than the zero-BAC limit proposed through the Road Traffic Amendment Bill) to allow for variance in testing. Recommendations centre on the proposed legislation incorporating a gradualist approach and its location within a broader zero-tolerance approach that includes other complementary interventions to enable implementation. Significance: The recommended blood alcohol level of 0.02 g/100 mL is lower than the best practice limit recommended by the World Health Organization of 0.05 g/100 mL, following consideration of the road safety and general alcohol consumption challenges in South Africa and evidence of success from other similar country contexts. Broad principles and recommendations are presented to support the sustainable adoption of zero-tolerance drink-driving legislation in the country

An analysis of the nature and implementation of zoning amendments in Windsor, Ontario.

Dept. of Geography. Paper copy at Leddy Library: Theses & Major Papers - Basement, West Bldg. / Call Number: Thesis1979 .S855. Source: Masters Abstracts International, Volume: 40-07, page: . Thesis (M.A.)--University of Windsor (Canada), 1979

An Accessible Web CAPTCHA Design for Visually Impaired Users

In the realm of computing, CAPTCHAs are used to determine if a user engaging with a system is a person or a bot. The most common CAPTCHAs are visual in nature, requiring users to recognize images comprising distorted characters or objects. For people with visual impairments, audio CAPTCHAs are accessible alternatives to standard visual CAPTCHAs. Users are required to enter or say the words in an audio-clip when using Audio CAPTCHAs. However, this approach is time-consuming and vulnerable to machine learning algorithms, since automated speech recognition (ASR) systems could eventually understand the content of audio with the improvement of the technique. While adding background noise may deceive ASR systems temporarily, it may cause people to have difficulties de- ciphering the information, thus reducing usability. To address this, we designed a more secure and accessible web CAPTCHA based on the capabilities of people with visually impairments, obviating the need for sight via the use of audio and movement, while also using object detection techniques to enhance the accessibility of the CAPTCHA

Obstructieve uropathie bij kinderen voorspellende waarde van 99m Tc-DTPA renografische studies verricht tijdens maximale diurese

De volgende vraagstelling lag ten grondslag aan het in het proefschrift beschreven onderzoek: l. Is het mogelijk een niet invasieve en eenvoudige methode aan te geven an op een betrouwbare manier obstructieve hogere urinewegsystemen te ondersdheiden van niet-obstructieve urinewegsystemen? 2. Is het mogeli jk een predictieve waarde aan de onderzoeksmethode toe te kennen opdat op voorhand kan worden gesteld welke systemen baat zouden kunnen hebben bij een operatie en welke niet? 3. Is kwantificeren van de verbetering van de nierfunctie na de operatie mogelijk? Een van de belangrijkste uitgangspunten was dat de onderzoeken onder gestandaardiseerde condities moesten worden uitgevoerd wat (veelal) niet het geval was bij de in de literatuur beschreven studies. Standaardisatie zou het mogelijk rnaken de patientenstudies in de foll~ up periode te vergelijken. Er werd gekozen voor een isotopenstudie door middel van het 99mrc-D!'PA onder condities van maximale diurese, verkregen tijdens hypotone volume expansie (HVE) (27 ,28). Van deze 99mrc-D!'PA renografische studies kon op voorhand worden gesteld dat: a. het mogelijk was de functie van de nieren afzonderlijk (in percentages) vast te stellen. b. inzicht in de uro-dynamische kwaliteiten van het hogere urinewegsysteem verkregen zou worden. Deze uro-dynamische eigenschappen zijn op twee manieren bestudeerd: a. met curven over de totale nier, met andere woorden over het parenchym en het pyelum. b. met een speciale rekenmethode, genaarrd PIFI (=Parenchymal area Identifying Functional Imaging). In de loop van de studieperiode werd het duidelijk dat door een speciale procedure toe te passen gedurende de eerste 7 minuten periode van het scanonderzoek, goede informatie kon worden verkregen over de functionerende parenchymale gebieden

Audio Description in Video Games Research in Progress

As video games continue to grow in popularity, accessibility is a key concern which developers must consider to ensure the most people possible can enjoy the games they create (Cairns et al., 2019; Nova et al., 2021). With approximately 500,000 blind and partially sighted people in Canada alone, visual accessibility is a central concern of game accessibility. Visual accessibility has developed for decades with one of the most popular and effective methods of this being audio description (AD) (Fryer, 2016). Audio description comes in different styles depending on its use, with standard and extended AD being 2 of the most common types (Canadian National Institute for the Blind, 2019). Despite the success of this option in film and television, AD has not caught on in the game industry (SightlessKombat, 2020). This research looks to investigate AD as a method for visual accessibility in video games with a focus on determining the advantages and disadvantages of both standard and extended AD in this medium

Cannabis and other drug use among trauma patients in three South African cities, 1999 - 2001

Objective. To assess the extent of cannabis and other drug use among patients presenting with recent  injuries at trauma units in Cape Town, Port Elizabeth and Durban from 1999 to 2001.Design. Cross-sectional surveys were conducted during a 4- week period at each of the above sites in  1999, 2000 and 2001. The concept of an idealised week was used to render representative samples.Outcome measures. Cause of injury and biological markers toassess use of cannabis, methaqualone (Mandrax), opiates, cocaine, amphetamine, and  methamphetamine.Results. Over half of all patients tested experienced violent injuries. Excluding opiates, across sites and over time between 33% and 62% of patients tested positive for at least one drug  (N = 1 565). In most cases the drugs were cannabis and/ or methaqualone. While no inter-city differences were found,male patients were typically more likely to test positive for drugs in general and specific drugs such as  cannabis and the cannabis/methaqualone ('white pipe') combination than female patients. Drug positivity was higher in 2001 than in the previous 2 years in Cape Town, and patients injured as a result of violence in Cape Town and Durban were more likely to test positive for drugs than patients with certain other types of injuries.Conclusions. Drug use among trauma patients has remained consistently high for each of the 3 study periods. Efforts to combat the abuse of drugs such as cannabis and methaqualone would appear to be paramount in reducing the burden of injuries on health care services. The study has raised numerous issues requiring further research

Applications of Microarray Technology to Acute Myelogenous Leukemia

Microarray technology is a powerful tool, which has been applied to further the understanding of gene expression changes in disease. Array technology has been applied to the diagnosis and prognosis of Acute Myelogenous Leukemia (AML). Arrays have also been used extensively in elucidating the mechanism of and predicting therapeutic response in AML, as well as to further define the mechanism of AML pathogenesis. In this review, we discuss the major paradigms of gene expression array analysis, and provide insights into the use of software tools to annotate the array dataset and elucidate deregulated pathways and gene interaction networks. We present the application of gene expression array technology to questions in acute myelogenous leukemia; specifically, disease diagnosis, treatment and prognosis, and disease pathogenesis. Finally, we discuss several new and emerging array technologies, and how they can be further utilized to improve our understanding of AML