Socioeconomic inequalities in access to health care: Examining the case of Burkina Faso

Copyright @ 2011 Johns Hopkins University PressThe past decade has recorded remarkable interest in socioeconomic inequalities in health care. A multivariate analysis of the World Health Survey data for Burkina Faso was conducted using STATA. This included questions on household economic factors, perceived need, and access to health care. Poverty was defined using Principal Components Analysis. There was no significant difference in perceived need on the basis of poverty or gender. The less poor accessed health care more than the poor, but this difference was significant only among males. Respondents who lived in urban areas accessed health care more than those in rural areas, but this difference was significant only among females. We argue that health care financing arrangements affect self-reported need and access to health care. Even when they perceive need, the poor do not access care, probably because of cost, exacerbated by non-availability of readily accessible health care facilities

Magnetic excitations in nuclei with neutron excess

The excitation of the $1^+$, $2^-$ and $3^+$ modes in $^{16}$O, $^{22}$O, $^{24}$O, $^{28}$O, $^{40}$Ca, $^{48}$Ca, $^{52}$Ca and $^{60}$Ca nuclei is studied with self-consistent random phase approximation calculations. Finite-range interactions of Gogny type, containing also tensor-isospin terms, are used. We analyze the evolution of the magnetic resonances with the increasing number of neutrons, the relevance of collective effects, the need of a correct treatment of the continuum and the role of the tensor force.Comment: 18 pages, 12 figures, 2 tables, accepted for publication in Physical Review

Low-lying magnetic excitations of doubly-closed-shell nuclei and nucleon-nucleon effective interactions

We have studied the low lying magnetic spectra of 12C, 16O, 40Ca, 48Ca and 208Pb nuclei within the Random Phase Approximation (RPA) theory, finding that the description of low-lying magnetic states of doubly-closed-shell nuclei imposes severe constraints on the spin and tensor terms of the nucleon-nucleon effective interaction. We have first made an investigation by using four phenomenological effective interactions and we have obtained good agreement with the experimental magnetic spectra, and, to a lesser extent, with the electron scattering responses. Then we have made self-consistent RPA calculations to test the validity of the finite-range D1 Gogny interaction. For all the nuclei under study we have found that this interaction inverts the energies of all the magnetic states forming isospin doublets.Comment: 19 pages, 13 figures, 7 tables, accepted for publication in Phys. Rev.

CHINESE THOUGHT AND THE BIRTH OF POSTMODERN CULTURE: THE WESTERN MAN’S EARLY ENCOUNTER WITH CHINA

The understanding of another culture leads to both respect for that culture, and a new understanding of one’s own culture. Before Eastern thought became popular in the West, there were already Westerners who explored the East and brought back stories about it; scholars and missionaries who began to patiently translate Eastern writings into Western languages. These early Western explorers discovered a new world of understanding which would gradually ignite the European imagination and transform its understanding of itself. This paper wishes to chart the very earliest Western encounters with the thought of China

Correlations and realistic interactions in doubly closed shell nuclei

We review the latest variational calculations of the ground state properties of doubly closed shell nuclei, from $^{12}$C to $^{208}$Pb, with semirealistic and realistic two- and three-nucleon interactions. The studies are carried on within the framework of the correlated basis function theory and integral equations technique, with state dependent correlations having central and tensor components. We report results for the ground state energy, one- and two-body densities and static structure functions. For $^{16}$O and $^{40}$Ca we use modern interactions and find that the accuracy of the method is comparable to that attained in nuclear matter with similar hamiltonians, giving nuclei underbound by $\sim$2 MeV/A. The computed Coulomb sums are in complete agreement with the latest analysis of the experimental data.Comment: 11 Latex pages, 2 ps figures. Talk delivered at the 10th International Conference on Recent Progress In Many-Body Theories, Seattle 1999. To appear in "Advances in Quantum Many-Body Theory", vol.3, World Scientifi

Upsilon cross section in p+p collisions at STAR

The main focus of the heavy flavor program at RHIC is to investigate the properties of the dense matter produced in heavy-ion collisions by studying its effect on open heavy flavor and quarkonia production. This in turn requires a detailed understanding of their production in elementary p+p collisions so that the dense matter effects can be later unfolded. In this paper, we present the first mid-rapidity cross section measurement of bottomonium at $\sqrt{s}=200$ GeV with the STAR experiment. We compare our results with perturbative QCD calculations. A brief status on the study of charmonium in STAR is given.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures. To appear in the proceedings of Quark Matter 2006 as a special issue of Journal of Physics G: Nuclear and Particle Physic

Lymphoma and hypercalcemia in a pediatric orthotopic liver transplant patient

We present a case report of a pediatric orthotopic liver transplant recipient who developed lymphoma with hypercalcemia on cyclosporine and prednisone immunosuppression. This is the first reported posttransplant lymphoproliferative disorder complicated by hypercalcemia, with a finding of an elevated 1,25 dihydroxyl vitamin D state, suggesting that it has a role in the pathophysiology of this B cell lymphoma hypercalcemia. The clinical course and management of this disorder with a 31-month follow-up are described. © 1989 by Williams & Wilkins

Globalization, migration and underdevelopment in West Africa

Migration is not a new phenomenon. However, globalization has put a new spin on  igration, which results in greater economic opportunities for the developed nations to the disadvantage of developing nations of Africa. Globalization implies and does entail free movement of goods and ideas between and across borders, trade liberalization, movement of capital for greater and speedier returns and repatriation of profits from quick yielding investments from the developing to the developed nations. The consequence is that, globalization exacerbates inequality between the developed and the developing nations. This paper demonstrates the various ways by which globalization impacts on migration and in the process engenders underdevelopment in West Africa. In the first place, the unencumbered movement of capital, trade and technology accompanied by capitalists “experts” from the developed nations into Africa has led not only to disruptions in African economies but also contributed to the high level of unemployment especially of the youth, wage decline, job insecurity and general poverty in the continent. In West Africa, agriculture is rendered purposeless on account of the massive agricultural subsidies enjoyed by the developed nations thereby increasing the tendency to dump their agricultural products in the sub-region. The migration of the disadvantaged and economically displaced peoples of Africa to the developed nations is a natural response to the severe pains and plunder inflicted on the continent by the forces of globalization and capitalism. In an attempt to address the imbalance created by globalization and to prevent Africans seeking economic refuge by migrating to their countries, the developed nations dangle such palliatives as debt relief and development aid that provide only cosmetic solutions to the problems of underdevelopment in West Africa that generates migration in the first place. The question is: What are West African leaders doing to contend with the challenges posed by globalization and migration in the West African sub-region? Finally, the paper examines policy contradictions within the global system towards migration and recommends a more integrated approach

A mass conserved reaction-diffusion system captures properties of cell polarity

Various molecules exclusively accumulate at the front or back of migrating eukaryotic cells in response to a shallow gradient of extracellular signals. Directional sensing and signal amplification highlight the essential properties in the migrating cells, known as cell polarity. In addition to these, such properties of cell polarity involve unique determination of migrating direction (uniqueness of axis) and localized gradient sensing at the front edge (localization of sensitivity), both of which may be required for smooth migration. Here we provide the mass conservation system based on the reaction-diffusion system with two components, where the mass of the two components is always conserved. Using two models belonging to this mass conservation system, we demonstrate through both numerical simulation and analytical approximations that the spatial pattern with a single peak (uniqueness of axis) can be generally observed and that the existent peak senses a gradient of parameters at the peak position, which guides the movement of the peak. We extended this system with multiple components, and we developed a multiple-component model in which cross-talk between members of the Rho family of small GTPases is involved. This model also exhibits the essential properties of the two models with two components. Thus, the mass conservation system shows properties similar to those of cell polarity, such as uniqueness of axis and localization of sensitivity, in addition to directional sensing and signal amplification.Comment: PDF onl