Prenatal screening, reproductive choice, and public health

One widely held view of prenatal screening (PNS) is that its foremost aim is, or should be, to enable reproductive choice; this is the Pure Choice view. The paper critiques this position by comparing it with an alternative: Public Health Pluralism. It is argued that there are good reasons to prefer the latter, including the following. (1) Public Health Pluralism does not, as is often supposed, render PNS more vulnerable to eugenics-objections. (2) The Pure Choice view, if followed through it its logical conclusions, may have unpalatable implications, such as extending choice well beyond health screening. (3) Any sensible version of Public Health Pluralism will be capable of taking on board the moral seriousness of abortion and will advocate, where practicable, alternative means of reducing the prevalence of disease and disability. (4) Public Health Pluralism is at least as well-equipped as the Pure Choice model to deal with autonomy consent issues

Trade Unions and Training Practices in British Workplaces

We use establishment-level data from the 1991 Employers Manpower and Skills Practices Survey (EMSPS) and individual-level data from the Autumn 1993 Quarterly Labour Force Survey (QLFS) to investigate the links between training provision and workplace unionization. We focus on two training measures, an incidence variable and an intensity variable. Both are strongly positively related to whether unions are recognised in the workplace. Working in a unionized establishment substantially raises the probability of receiving training and the amount of training received by British workers. We view these results as confirming the potentially important role that British unions can play in developing skill formation.

Exploitation in international paid surrogacy arrangements

Many critics have suggested that international paid surrogacy is exploitative. Taking such concerns as its starting point, this paper asks: (1) How defensible is the claim that international paid surrogacy is exploitative and what could be done to make it less exploitative? (2) In the light of the answer to (1), how strong is the case for prohibiting it? Exploitation could in principle be dealt with by improving surrogates’ pay and conditions. However, doing so may exacerbate problems with consent. Foremost amongst these is the argument that surrogates from economically disadvantaged countries cannot validly consent because their background circumstances are coercive. Several versions of this argument are examined and I conclude that at least one has some merit. The paper’s overall conclusion is that while ethically there is something to be concerned about, paid surrogacy is in no worse a position than many other exploitative commercial transactions which take place against a backdrop of global inequality and constrained options, such as poorly paid and dangerous construction work. Hence, there is little reason to single surrogacy out for special condemnation. On a policy level, the case for prohibiting international commercial surrogacy is weak, despite legitimate concerns about consent and background poverty

Detective fiction in Cuban society and culture.

PhDThe object of this thesis is to reach towards an understanding of Cuban society through a study of its detective fiction and more particularly contemporary Cuban society through the novels of the author and critic, Leonardo Padura Fuentes. The method has been to trace the development of Cuban detective writing and to read Padura Fuentes in the light of the work of twentieth century Western European literary critics and philosophers including Raymond Williams, Antonio Gramsci, Terry Eagleton, Roland Barthes, Jean Paul Sartre, Michel Foucault, Jean François Lyotard and Jean Baudrillard in order to gain a better understanding of the social and historical context from which this genre emerged. By concentrating on the literary texts, I have explored readings which lead out into an analysis of the broader philosophical, political and historical issues raised by the Cuban revolution. Since it deals primarily with modes of deviance and notions of legality and justice within the context of the modern state, detective fiction is particularly well suited to this type of investigation. The intention is to show how this is as valid in the Cuban context as it is in advanced capitalist societies where such research has already been carried out with some success. The thesis comprises an introduction, ten chapters and a conclusion. The chapters are divided into three sections. Chapters 1 to 3 attempt a broad theoretical, historical and socio-political analysis of the cultural reality within which the Cuban revolutionary detective genre emerged. Chapters 4 to 6 analyse the Cuban detective narrative from its inception in the early part of the twentieth century until the emergence of Leonardo Padura Fuentes as the foremost exponent of the genre in Cuba after 1991. Chapters 7- 10 concentrate upon the work of Leonardo Padura Fuentes, offering a reading of his detective tetralogy informed by the preceding discussion. The contribution made by the thesis to knowledge of the subject is to build upon the work of Seymour Menton and Amelia S. Simpson on the development of the Cuban detective novel and to provide analyses of the pre-Revolutionary Cuban detective narrative and the work of Leonardo Padura Fuentes for the first time in the English language. The thesis concludes that the study of this popular genre in Cuba is of crucial importance to the scholar who wishes to reach as full an understanding of the social dynamics within that society as possible. In particular, it proves that Cuban detective fiction provides a useful barometer of social change which records the shifts in the Cuban Zeitgeist that have taken place over the past century

Should uterus transplants be publicly funded?

Since 2000, eleven human uterine transplantation procedures (UTx) have been performed across Europe and Asia. Five of these have, to date, resulted in pregnancy and four live births have now been recorded. The most significant obstacles to the availability of UTx are presently scientific and technical, relating to the safety and efficacy of the procedure itself. However, if and when such obstacles are overcome, the most likely barriers to its availability will be social and financial in nature, relating in particular to the ability and willingness of patients, insurers, or the state to pay. Thus, publicly funded healthcare systems such as the UK’s National Health Service (NHS) will eventually have to decide whether UTx should be funded. With this in mind, we seek to provide an answer to the question of whether there exist any compelling reasons for the state not to fund UTx. The paper proceeds as follows. It assumes, at least for the sake of argument, that UTx will become sufficiently safe and cost-effective to be a candidate for funding and then asks, given that, what objections to funding there might be. Three main arguments are considered and ultimately rejected as providing insufficient reason to withhold funding for UTx. The first two are broad in their scope and offer an opportunity to reflect on wider issues about funding for infertility treatment in general. The third is narrower in scope and could, in certain forms, apply to UTx but not other assisted reproductive technologies (ARTs). The first argument suggests that UTx should not be publicly funded because doing so would be inconsistent with governments’ obligations to prevent climate change and environmental pollution. The second claims that UTx does not treat a disorder and is not medically necessary. Finally, the third asserts that funding for UTx should be denied because of the availability of alternatives such as adoption and surrogacy

A Review of Hypersonic Boundary Layer Stability Experiments in a Quiet Mach 6 Wind Tunnel

Three recent experimental studies of transition on cones with adverse pressure gradient produced by a flared afterbody and with the additive stability modifiers of wall cooling, angle of attack and bluntness are reviewed. All tests were conducted in a quiet Mach 6 wind tunnel. The dominant instability was found to be the second mode. For the cases examined with linear stability theory, the N factors at mode saturation were in the range of 8.5 to 11. Evidence of a combined second-mode/Gortler transition process was found. Mean, rms and spectral freestream data for the quiet facility is presented and the role of low frequency freestream noise is discussed