An Incomplete Recovery: Youth Unemployment in Europe 2008 – 2016

After having endured many years of economic decline and other problems as- sociated with the financial and economic crisis between 2008 and 2013, most EU member states have resumed their upward trend. This development is due primarily to ongoing improvements in the labour market1. Although not all EU member states have achieved their pre-crisis unemployment levels (EU average in 2008: 7%), the average unemployment rate has fallen from its high point of 11% in 2013 to 8.7% in 2016. Similar trends hold true in Europe for youth unemployment levels, which bears particular consequences for unem- ployment and economic growth overall. This paper takes a closer look at this topic and its development since the Great Recession, thereby highlighting the situation among different subgroups of young people in EU countries. Ten years ago, youth labour markets in Europe and beyond were hit hard by the Great Recession, leaving many young people to struggle with finding and retaining sustainable jobs in a protracted period of (multiple) recession(s). At the height of the youth employment crisis in 2012/2013, more than 9 million young people aged 15-29 across the EU were unemployed, 3 million more than in 2007. Since then, the youth labour market has improved, though perfor- mance indicators have not yet returned to pre-crisis levels. Since 2013, some member states have seen stronger improvements in this re- gard than others, although this varies among different subgroups of young people. Clearly, integrating young people into education, employment and training systems poses a long-term policy challenge for all member states. Persistent structural problems in European labour markets make an immi- nent, rapid improvement of the situation for young people unlikely. Further action is thus needed to support this demographic in fulfilling their potential in European economies and societies. The EU has responded to this youth employment crisis by proposing a range of successive policy measures. Its most prominent recommendations include the call to establish a Youth Guarantee2 and the Youth Employment Initiative. The Youth Guarantee shall ensure that young people have access to quality employment, education, apprenticeship or training opportunities within four months of becoming unemployed. The Youth Employment Initiative provides additional funding to tackle high rates of young people not in employment, education or training (NEET) in European regions most affected by youth unemployment

Soziale Nachhaltigkeit bei Gewinnung und Bindung von Berufskraftfahrerinnen und -fahrern in der Logistikbranche

Wie zahlreichen Veröffentlichungen der letzten Zeit zu entnehmen ist, stehen Unternehmen der Gütertransportlogistik u. a. vor der Herausforderung, Berufs-kraftfahrer_innen zu rekrutieren und an sich zu binden. Unter dem Dach "Sozial nachhaltiges Personalmanagement" wurde eine Befragung von Logistikunternehmen durchgeführt, deren Ergebnisse Aufschluss zur derzeitigen Handhabung der Gewinnung und Bindung von Fahrerpersonal sowie zur Verankerung von sozialer Nachhaltigkeit in ihren Organisationen geben. Die der Studie zugrunde gelegten Annahmen wurden z. T. bestätigt; abweichende Rückmeldungen wurden näher untersucht und hinterfragt. Die durch die Umfrage ermittelte Ausgangssituation in den teilnehmenden Logistik-unternehmen diente als Basis zur Eruierung von Optimierungsmaßnahmen, welche als Handlungsempfehlungen ausgesprochen werden. Das vorliegende Diskussionspapier konzentriert sich auf ausgewählte Aspekte der gesamten Untersuchung, denen besondere Aufmerksamkeit beizumessen ist.As discussed in a broad variety of recent publications, many companies in the transportation sector face the challenge of recruiting and retaining truck drivers. Under the umbrella of a 'socially sustainable human resource management' the authors of this paper conducted a survey in the logistics industry. The survey's results show how enterprises currently recruit and retain drivers and how they anchor social sustainability in their organizations. Most of the underlying assumptions could be confirmed; differing responses were analyzed in depth. The as-is-situation in the companies, as identified by the survey results, were used as a basis for recommended optimization measures. The discussion paper focuses on those topics of the survey that generate the most relevant implications for the logistics industry

Prosodic prominence in parkinsonian speech : a dynamical approach

In the present study, we investigate dynamic changes in prosodic highlighting strategies in PD patients and compare them to the productions of neurotypical speakers. Therefore, we compare the production of target words in divergent focus structure, contrastive focus and background. We recorded 40 German speakers: 20 patients with idiopathic Parkinson in medication ON condition, 14 males and 6 females, aged between 54 - 80 and 20 healthy aged and gender matched controls. All speakers were classified in terms of duration of the disorder, severity of the disorder, motoric activity level (UPDRS III, [6]), level of cognition and speech problems in terms of dysarthria. As speech material, we used a question-answer scenario presented on a computer screen to manipulate focal structure by means of contextualizing contexts. Nine target words were placed in either contrastive focus or background position in sentences such as (“The fly has touched the green nose.”) related to pictures on a computer screen [cf. fig.1]. Target words were always disyllabic (CV.CV structure), containing one of the three long vowels /i:/, /a:/ or /o:/, in the stressed syllable, such as /na:z@/. In total, we recorded 1440 tokens (9 target words x 40 speakers x 2 focus structures x 2 adjectives). For acoustic measurements, we analyzed the voice range, syllable duration, formant means and contours, the mean intensity and the F0 contours in terms of pitch height and tonal onglide [7]. For the upcoming conference, the results of all intonational and articulatory variables will be presented. We will discuss how much variation is tolerated in a dynamical system of prosodic prominence before the expression of prosodic functions is getting instable

Cognitive skills and prominence production : highlighting prominent elements in the speech of patients with Parkinson's disease

Patients with idiopathic parkinsonism suffer from a neurodegenerative disorder of the nervous system. Due to a progressive loss of dopaminergic cells in the substantia nigra patients with Parkinson’s disease (PD) develop problems with motor and non-motor functions. On the motor level the dysfunctions defect the voluntary movements and lead to symptoms like: rigidity, resting tremor and bradykinesia [1]. On the level of cognition PD patients have problems with the executive functions, cognitive flexibility, working memory and control of attention [2]. Furthermore, the speech system gets affected which often leads to dysarthric speech. This hypokinetic dysarthria impacts the phonation, articulation and the respiratory system. The speech deficits include monoloudness, monopitch, reduced stress, imprecise articulation, variability of speech rate, disfluencies and voice tremor [3, 4, 5].PD affects communication as well as other related functions such as cognition, but complex prosodic aspects such as focus marking are less well studied. Prominence marking in German requires changes in intonation and articulation [6]. Speakers use multiple cues in the phonetic domain to regulate prosodic marking [7], e.g. modulation of F0 and syllable duration. Furthermore, there is insufficient literature on the impact of cognition on these phonetic aspects of prominence marking. The aim of this study is to analyse how prosodic prominence correlates with motoric and cognitive abilities in patients with Parkinson’s disease in the complex process of speech production

Task-based profiles of language impairment and their relationship to cognitive dysfunction in Parkinson’s disease

Objective: Parkinson's Disease (PD) is associated with both motor and non-motor problems, such as cognitive impairment. Particular focus in this area has been on the relationship between language impairment and decline in other cognitive functions, with the literature currently inconclusive on how the nature and degree of language impairment relate to cognition or other measures of disease severity. In addition, little information is available on how language problems identified in experimental task set-ups relate to competency in self-generated language paradigms such as picture description, monologues or conversations. This study aimed to inform clinical management of language impairment in PD by exploring (1) language performance across a range of experimental as well as self-generated language tasks, (2) how the relationship between these two aspects might be affected by the nature of the cognitive and language assessment; and (3) to what degree performance can be predicted across the language tasks. Methods: 22 non-demented people with PD (PwPD) and 22 healthy control participants performed a range of cognitive and language tasks. Cognitive tasks included a screening assessment in addition to tests for set shifting, short term memory, attention, as well as letter and category fluency. Language was investigated in highly controlled grammar tasks as well as a Sentence Generation and a Narrative. Results: The study highlighted impaired ability in set-shifting and letter fluency in the executive function tasks, and a higher rate of grammatical and lexical errors across all language tasks in the PD group. The performance in the grammar task was linked to set shifting ability, but error rates in Sentence Generation and Narrative were independent of this. There was no relevant relationship between performances across the three language tasks. Conclusions: Our results suggest that there is a link between executive function and language performance, but that this is task dependent in non-demented PwPD. This has implications for the management of language impairment in PD, both for assessment and for designing effective interventions

Genetic Variation in ABCC4 and CFTR and Acute Pancreatitis during Treatment of Pediatric Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia

Background: Acute pancreatitis (AP) is a serious, mechanistically not entirely resolved side effect of L-asparaginase-containing treatment for acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL). To find new candidate variations for AP, we conducted a genome-wide association study (GWAS). Methods: In all, 1,004,623 single-nucleotide variants (SNVs) were analyzed in 51 pediatric ALL patients with AP (cases) and 1388 patients without AP (controls). Replication used independent patients. Results: The top-ranked SNV (rs4148513) was located within the ABCC4 gene (odds ratio (OR) 84.1; p = 1.04 × 10−14). Independent replication of our 20 top SNVs was not supportive of initial results, partly because rare variants were neither present in cases nor present in controls. However, results of combined analysis (GWAS and replication cohorts) remained significant (e.g., rs4148513; OR = 47.2; p = 7.31 × 10−9). Subsequently, we sequenced the entire ABCC4 gene and its close relative, the cystic fibrosis associated CFTR gene, a strong AP candidate gene, in 48 cases and 47 controls. Six AP-associated variants in ABCC4 and one variant in CFTR were detected. Replication confirmed the six ABCC4 variants but not the CFTR variant. Conclusions: Genetic variation within the ABCC4 gene was associated with AP during the treatment of ALL. No association of AP with CFTR was observed. Larger international studies are necessary to more conclusively assess the risk of rare clinical phenotypes

Frequent and sex-biased deletion of SLX4IP by illegitimate V(D)J-mediated recombination in childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia

Acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) accounts for ∼25% of pediatric malignancies. Of interest, the incidence of ALL is observed ∼20% higher in males relative to females. The mechanism behind the phenomenon of sex-specific differences is presently not understood. Employing genome-wide genetic aberration screening in 19 ALL samples, one of the most recurrent lesions identified was monoallelic deletion of the 5′ region of SLX4IP. We characterized this deletion by conventional molecular genetic techniques and analyzed its interrelationships with biological and clinical characteristics using specimens and data from 993 pediatric patients enrolled into trial AIEOP-BFM ALL 2000. Deletion of SLX4IP was detected in ∼30% of patients. Breakpoints within SLX4IP were defined to recurrent positions and revealed junctions with typical characteristics of illegitimate V(D)J-mediated recombination. In initial and validation analyses, SLX4IP deletions were significantly associated with male gender and ETV6/RUNX1-rearranged ALL (both overall P < 0.0001). For mechanistic validation, a second recurrent deletion affecting TAL1 and caused by the same molecular mechanism was analyzed in 1149 T-cell ALL patients. Validating a differential role by sex of illegitimate V(D)J-mediated recombination at the TAL1 locus, 128 out of 1149 T-cell ALL samples bore a deletion and males were significantly more often affected (P = 0.002). The repeatedly detected association of SLX4IP deletion with male sex and the extension of the sex bias to deletion of the TAL1 locus suggest that differential illegitimate V(D)J-mediated recombination events at specific loci may contribute to the consistent observation of higher incidence rates of childhood ALL in boys compared with girl

Spider Silk Constructs Enhance Axonal Regeneration and Remyelination in Long Nerve Defects in Sheep

BACKGROUND: Surgical reapposition of peripheral nerve results in some axonal regeneration and functional recovery, but the clinical outcome in long distance nerve defects is disappointing and research continues to utilize further interventional approaches to optimize functional recovery. We describe the use of nerve constructs consisting of decellularized vein grafts filled with spider silk fibers as a guiding material to bridge a 6.0 cm tibial nerve defect in adult sheep. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: The nerve constructs were compared to autologous nerve grafts. Regeneration was evaluated for clinical, electrophysiological and histological outcome. Electrophysiological recordings were obtained at 6 months and 10 months post surgery in each group. Ten months later, the nerves were removed and prepared for immunostaining, electrophysiological and electron microscopy. Immunostaining for sodium channel (NaV 1.6) was used to define nodes of Ranvier on regenerated axons in combination with anti-S100 and neurofilament. Anti-S100 was used to identify Schwann cells. Axons regenerated through the constructs and were myelinated indicating migration of Schwann cells into the constructs. Nodes of Ranvier between myelin segments were observed and identified by intense sodium channel (NaV 1.6) staining on the regenerated axons. There was no significant difference in electrophysiological results between control autologous experimental and construct implantation indicating that our construct are an effective alternative to autologous nerve transplantation. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: This study demonstrates that spider silk enhances Schwann cell migration, axonal regrowth and remyelination including electrophysiological recovery in a long-distance peripheral nerve gap model resulting in functional recovery. This improvement in nerve regeneration could have significant clinical implications for reconstructive nerve surgery

Viscum album L. extracts in breast and gynaecological cancers: a systematic review of clinical and preclinical research

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p><it>Viscum album </it>L. extracts (VAE, European mistletoe) are a widely used medicinal plant extract in gynaecological and breast-cancer treatment.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Systematic review to evaluate clinical studies and preclinical research on the therapeutic effectiveness and biological effects of VAE on gynaecological and breast cancer. Search of databases, reference lists and expert consultations. Criteria-based assessment of methodological study quality.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>19 randomized (RCT), 16 non-randomized (non-RCT) controlled studies, and 11 single-arm cohort studies were identified that investigated VAE treatment of breast or gynaecological cancer. They included 2420, 6399 and 1130 patients respectively. 8 RCTs and 8 non-RCTs were embedded in the same large epidemiological cohort study. 9 RCTs and 13 non-RCTs assessed survival; 12 reported a statistically significant benefit, the others either a trend or no difference. 3 RCTs and 6 non-RCTs assessed tumour behaviour (remission or time to relapse); 3 reported statistically significant benefit, the others either a trend, no difference or mixed results. Quality of life (QoL) and tolerability of chemotherapy, radiotherapy or surgery was assessed in 15 RCTs and 9 non-RCTs. 21 reported a statistically significant positive result, the others either a trend, no difference, or mixed results. Methodological quality of the studies differed substantially; some had major limitations, especially RCTs on survival and tumour behaviour had very small sample sizes. Some recent studies, however, especially on QoL were reasonably well conducted. Single-arm cohort studies investigated tumour behaviour, QoL, pharmacokinetics and safety of VAE. Tumour remission was observed after high dosage and local application. VAE application was well tolerated. 34 animal experiments investigated VAE and isolated or recombinant compounds in various breast and gynaecological cancer models in mice and rats. VAE showed increase of survival and tumour remission especially in mice, while application in rats as well as application of VAE compounds had mixed results. <it>In vitro </it>VAE and its compounds have strong cytotoxic effects on cancer cells.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>VAE shows some positive effects in breast and gynaecological cancer. More research into clinical efficacy is warranted.</p