Summary of resolutions recently adopted by CDCC and resolutions of ECLAC and other organs of the United Nations which might be of special interest to member countries of ECLAC/CDCC

This paper brings to the attention of member countries of the Caribbean Development and Cooperation Committee (CDCC) resolutions adopted by past sessions of the Committee, since 2000, and the process of their implementation. Resolutions 55 to 66 for the period 2000- 2006 have been extracted from the reports of the eighteenth to twenty first sessions of the CDCC Also included for the information of member countries are selected resolutions recently adopted by the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) and other organs of the United Nations. These resolutions greatly influence the preparation of the programme of work and are expected guide the day-to-day functioning of the secretariat. It is a great source of information for delegations, given the perceived special relevance of the resolutions to the membership of the CDCC. The resolutions listed in this document are pertinent to all subprogrammes of ECLAC and indeed the CDCC subprogramme 12 of ECLAC. However, the content of these resolutions either marked no real advance on the outcomes of the corresponding conferences that were held within recent times or were cast in a globally relevant context that did not address specific concerns of Caribbean countries to any significant extent.

Resolutions adopted by the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean at its Thirty-Sixth Session

Resolution 697(XXXVI) Horizons 2030 resolution .-- Resolution 698(XXXVI) ECLAC calendar of conferences for the period 2017-2018 .-- Resolution 699(XXXVI) Regional Conference on Women in Latin America and the Caribbean .-- Resolution 700(XXXVI) Mexico resolution on the establishment of the Forum of the Countries of Latin America and the Caribbean on Sustainable Development .-- Resolution 701(XXXVI) Support for the work of the Latin American and Caribbean Institute for Economic and Social Planning (ILPES) .-- Resolution 702(XXXVI) Statistical Conference of the Americas of the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean .-- Resolution 703(XXXVI) Regional Conference on Social Development in Latin America and the Caribbean .-- Resolution 704(XXXVI) Programme of work and priorities of the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean for the biennium 2018-2019 .-- Resolution 705(XXXVI) Caribbean Development and Cooperation Committee .-- Resolution 706(XXXVI) Application of Principle 10 of the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development in Latin America and the Caribbean .-- Resolution 707(XXXVI) Regional Conference on Population and Development in Latin America and the Caribbean .-- Resolution 708(XXXVI) Ministerial Conference on the Information Society in Latin America and the Caribbean .-- Resolution 709(XXXVI) Committee on South-South Cooperation .-- Resolution 710(XXXVI) Conference on Science, Innovation and Information and Communications Technologies of the Economic Commission for Latin America and The Caribbean .-- Resolution 711(XXXVI) Implementation of the Vienna Programme of Action for Landlocked Developing Countries for the Decade 2014-2024 .-- Resolution 712(XXXVI) Regional integration of statistical and geospatial information .-- Resolution 713(XXXVI) Regional follow-up to the outcomes of conferences on financing for development .-- Resolution 714(XXXVI) Place of the next session.

Family Health Support Centers: challenges and opportunities from the perspective of primary care professionals in the city of Sao Paulo, Brazil

Family Health Support Centers (NASF) were created in Brazil to increase the case-resolution capacity of primary healthcare. Prior to their implementation in the West Side of the city of Sao Paulo, Brazil, a series of workshops were held for primary healthcare professionals to prepare a proposal for such centers. Hermeneutic analysis was used to study the transcribed material. The thematic categories were: role, constitution, and functioning of the NASF, relationship with family health teams, and interdisciplinarity. The participants' expected the NASF to be an empowering device for comprehensiveness of care, intervening in an existing culture of unnecessary referrals while fostering linkage with other levels of care. The participants also expected the NASF to contribute to the discussion on health professionals' training and stimulating reflection with policy-makers on health indicators based exclusively on the number of consultations. These indicators fail to reflect the impact on the services' activities and the quality of care offered to the population in the coverage area.

Cost-effectiveness and budget impact of saxagliptine as additional therapy to metformin for the treatment of diabetes mellitus type 2 in the Brazilian private health system

Cost-effectiveness and budget impact of saxagliptine as additional therapy to metformin for the treatment of diabetes mellitus type 2 in the Brazilian private health system Objectives: To compare costs and clinical benefits of three additional therapies to metformin (MF) for patients with diabetes mellitus type 2 (DM2). Methods: A discrete event simulation model seas built to estimate the cost-utility ratio (cost per quality-adjusted life years [QALY)) of saxagliptine as an additional therapy to MF when compared to rosiglitazone or pioglitazone. A budget impact model (BIM) was built to simulate the economic impact of saxagliptine use in the context of the Brazilian private health system. Results: The acquiring medication costs for the hypothetical patient group analyzed in a time frame of three years, were R$ 10,850,185, R$ 14,836,265 and R$ 14,679,099 for saxagliptine, pioglitazone and rosiglitazone, respectively. Saxagliptine showed lower costs and greater effectiveness in both comparisons, with projected savings for the first three years of R$ 3,874 and R$ 3,996, respectively. The BIM estimated cumulative savings of R$ 417,958 with the repayment of saxagliptine in three years from the perspective of a health plan with 1,000,000 covered individuals. Conclusion: From the perspective of private paying source, the projection is that adding saxagliptine with MF save costs when compared with the addition of rosiglitazone or pioglitazone in patients with DM2 that have not reached the HbA1c goal with metformin monotherapy. The BIM of including saxagliptine in the reimbursement lists of health plans indicated significant savings on the three-year horizon.

Public Monuments and the Development of Siamese Nationalism, 1908-1945

A careful study of Siam's public monuments is the key to understanding the development of the Siamese nation in its formative period, from 1908 to 1945. As Siam's elites attempted to modernize the state in order to compete with the more developed powers of the West, they recognized that nationalism could potentially be used as a force to increase popular unity, consolidate modernization programs, legitimize their own authority, and protect the country from foreign conquest. The problem they faced, however, was how best to communicate nationalism to the people. Different factions throughout this era had their own idea of what it meant to be Siamese, and all of them wanted to control the national image. But literacy in Siam was extremely low, and art too expensive for most individuals to possess. Public political monuments, the focus of this thesis, therefore became the primary means of manifesting and propagating the underlying tenets of the new Siamese nation. Public monuments express the changing imaginings of the Siamese nation in this period of enormous transformations and turbulence, through the motives behind their commissioning, the political messages they convey, and popular reactions to the monuments. Three primary strains of Siamese nationalism emerged during this period: royalist nationalism, republican nationalism, and military nationalism. These three imaginings of the nation continually developed and interacted with each other, but each was particularly dominant at a given time in Siamese history. Monuments of the royalist period (1908-1925) embody the desire of Siam's kings to not only promote national pride amongst the Siamese people, but also advocate an image of nation and king as one. Monuments of the republican period (1925-1939) express the changing and sometimes contradictory events of their times, as they demonstrate new national values based on the sovereignty of the people, the value of the constitution, and the growing power of the military. And monuments of the military period (1939-1945) espouse an assertive and militaristic national image of warfare, patriotism, authority, and vigor. This thesis explores the nationalistic themes expressed in these monuments, and how these themes played out in the course of Siam's wider history.

Sudden Death after Chest Pain: Feasibility of Virtual Autopsy with Postmortem CT Angiography and Biopsy

Purpose:To determine the potential of minimally invasive postmortem computed tomographic (CT) angiography combined with image-guided tissue biopsy of the myocardium and lungs in decedents who were thought to have died of acute chest disease and to compare this method with conventional autopsy as the reference standard.Materials and Methods:The responsible justice department and ethics committee approved this study. Twenty corpses (four female corpses and 16 male corpses; age range, 15-80 years), all of whom were reported to have had antemortem acute chest pain, were imaged with postmortem whole-body CT angiography and underwent standardized image-guided biopsy. The standard included three biopsies of the myocardium and a single biopsy of bilateral central lung tissue. Additional biopsies of pulmonary clots for differentiation of pulmonary embolism and postmortem organized thrombus were performed after initial analysis of the cross-sectional images. Subsequent traditional autopsy with sampling of histologic specimens was performed in all cases. Thereafter, conventional histologic and autopsy reports were compared with postmortem CT angiography and CT-guided biopsy findings. A Cohen k coefficient analysis was performed to explore the effect of the clustered nature of the data.Results:In 19 of the 20 cadavers, findings at postmortem CT angiography in combination with CT-guided biopsy validated the cause of death found at traditional autopsy. In one cadaver, early myocardial infarction of the papillary muscles had been missed. The Cohen κ coefficient was 0.94. There were four instances of pulmonary embolism, three aortic dissections (Stanford type A), three myocardial infarctions, three instances of fresh coronary thrombosis, three cases of obstructive coronary artery disease, one ruptured ulcer of the ascending aorta, one ruptured aneurysm of the right subclavian artery, one case of myocarditis, and one pulmonary malignancy with pulmonary artery erosion. In seven of 20 cadavers, CT-guided biopsy provided additional histopathologic information that substantiated the final diagnosis of the cause of death.Conclusion:Postmortem CT angiography combined with image-guided biopsy, because of their minimally invasive nature, have a potential role in the detection of the cause of death after acute chest pain.© RSNA, 2012.

The Presidential Institution in Bulgaria, Albania and Romani: An Attempt at Comparison"

Bulgaria, Albania and Romania are all parliamentary republics with a president as head of state. Although the Albanian president is elected by Parliament, he is arguably the strongest of the three, both in terms of the powers allowed by the provisional constitution and of Mr. Berisha's political practice. The constitutional reform underway in the country will however change the status quo. In Bulgaria and Romania the presidents are elected directly by popular vote, but their powers are relatively small as compared to the democratic legitimisation implied by direct elections. Actual presidential powers should however be assessed with caution as some of them are set by law or interpretations of constitutional texts, rather than by the constitutions themselves. There is also variation in the degree to which the presidents in office have exploited their constitutional powers or taken their role as non-aligned political brokers seriously. Mr. Berisha, in particular, was in control of party politics throughout his presidency and was one of the most polarising influences on public opinion. The excessive political polarisation in all three countries has however its own logic and power. Thus Mr. Zhelev invariably supported the emergence of a political centre in Bulgaria, but this did not succeed and the policy was as damaging to his political career as the fight with would-be centrists was to Berisha's. Political practice in all three countries seems to need a presidential figure. This adds flexibility to a situation governed by hostile and mutually suspicious parties, stuck parliaments and weak or inexperienced governments. The presidents also command considerable influence on public opinion. Public opinion in Bulgaria, for example, largely supports the idea of greater power for the president, in contrast with the opinions of constitutionalists and other law-makers in the country. Under the legacy of the past, the people have a love-hate relationship with such paternalist figures. Presidents personalise politics in the public mind, but they can also become scapegoats for political failures.

Specialisation and specialist education in prosthetic dentistry in Europe

This presentation reports on the results of a meeting of prosthodontists from selected European countries. The aim of the meeting was to analyse and promote specialisation and specialist education in Prosthetic Dentistry in Europe. Representatives for Europe were selected from the European Prosthodontic Association (EPA) board, the Education and Research Committee of International College of Prosthodontists (ICP), countries with a legally recognised speciality, countries without a recognised speciality but organised training programmes and countries with neither of these situations. Data about specialisation and specialist training in Prosthodontics in Europe was scrutinised and discussed. The programmes for countries with specialist training had relatively similar content, mostly of three years duration. There was strong agreement that a recognised speciality raises the level of care within the discipline for both specialists and non-specialists. In several of the countries where a speciality had been introduced it had been initiated by pressure from public health planning authorities. The conclusions are that from a professional viewpoint an advancement of the speciality over Europe would develop the discipline, improve oral health planning and quality of patient care. A working group for harmonisation was recommended.

An Economic Comparison of Rotational Grazing Systems to Eight Crop Alternatives and the CRP Option for Highly Erodible Land in Southwest Iowa

Economic comparisons of income on highly erodible land (HEL) in Adams County were made utilizing five years of grazing data collected from a 13- paddock intensive-rotational grazing system and a four-paddock rotational-grazing system and four years of data collected from an 18-paddock intensive-rotational grazing system, all at the Adams County CRP Research and Demonstration Farm near Corning. Net income from the average grazing weight-gain of Angus-sired calves nursing crossbred cows was compared to the net income from grazing yearling steers, to the net income of eight NRCS-recommended crop rotations, and to the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) option. Results of these comparisons show the 13-paddock intensive rotational grazing system with cow-calf pairs to be the most profitable alternative, with a net return of $19.86 per acre per year. The second most profitable alternative is the CRP option, with a net return of $13.09 per acre, and the third most profitable option is the fourpaddock rotation with cows and calves with a net return of $12.53 per acre. An 18-paddock system returned a net income of $2.47 per acre per year with cows and calves in 1993, but lost an average of $107.69 per acre each year in 1994 and 1995 with yearling steers. Each year, the steers were purchased high and sold low, contributing to the large loss per acre. The following recommended crop rotations all show net losses on these 9-14 % slope, Adair-Shelby Complex soils (ApD3): continuous corn; corn-soybean rotation; corn-soybean rotation with a farm program deficiency payment; corn-corn-corn-oats-meadow-meadow rotation with grass headlands; continuous corn to “T” with grass headlands and buffer strips; continuous corn to “T” with grass headlands, buffer strips, and a deficiency payment; corn-corn-oats-meadow rotation to “T”; and corn-soybeans-oats-meadow-meadow-meadow-meadow rotation to “T”. Per-acre yield assumptions of 90 bushels for corn, 30 bushels for soybeans, 45 bushels for oats, and four tons for alfalfa were used, with per-bushel prices of $2.40 on corn, $5.50 on soybeans, and $1.50 on oats. Alfalfa hay was priced at $40.00 per ton and grass hay at $33.33 per ton. The calf weight-gain in the cow/ calf systems was valued at $.90 per pound. All crop expenses except land costs were calculated from ISU publication Fm 1712, “Estimated Costs of Crop Production in Iowa - 1995.” Land costs were determined by using an opportunity cost and actual property tax figures for the land at the grazing site. In preparation for the end of the CRP beginning in 1996, further economic comparisons will be made after additional grazing seasons and data collection. This project is an interagency cooperative effort sponsored by the Southern Iowa Forage and Livestock Committee which has special permission from the USDA Farm Service Agency (FSA) to use CRP land for research and demonstration.

Distamycin-NA: A DNA Analog with an Aromatic Heterocyclic Polyamide Backbone. Part 1. Synthesis and structural analysis of monomers and dimers containing the nucleobase uracil

The synthesis of the monomeric building block 13 and its constitutional isomer 12 of a new type of DNA analog, distamycin-NA, is presented (Schemes 1 and 2). This building block consists of a uracil base attached to a thiophene core unit via a biaryl-like axis. Next to the biaryl-like axis on the thiophene chromophore, a carboxy and an amino substituent are located allowing for oligomerization via peptide coupling. The proof of constitution and the conformational preferences about the biaryl-like axis were established by means of X-ray analyses of the corresponding nitro derivatives 10 and 11. Thus, the uracil bases are propeller-twisted relative to the thiophene core, and bidentate H-bonds occur between two uracil bases in the crystals. The two amino-acid building blocks 12 and 13 were coupled to give the dimers 15 and 16 using dicyclohexylcarbodiimide (DCC) in THF/LiCl and DMF, respectively. While the dimer 15 showed no atropisomerism on the NMR time scale at room temperature, its isomer 16 occurred as distinct diastereoisomers due to the hindered rotation around its biaryl-like axis. Variable-temperature 1H-NMR experiments allowed to determine a rotational barrier of 19 ± 1 kcal/mol in 16. The experimental data were complemented by AM1 calculations.

A comprehensive framework for evaluating funder's performance

Evaluation methods for assessing the performance of non-profit funders are lacking. The purpose of the research was to create a comprehensive framework that systematically assesses the goals and objectives of a funder, how these relate to the funder's allocation of resources, and the potential impact of programs and services selected by the funder for resource allocation to address organizational goals and objectives. The Houston Affiliate of Susan G. Komen for the Cure, a local chapter of a national breast cancer awareness advocacy organization, was selected as the funding agency whose performance assessment was to assist in the creation of this framework. Evaluation approaches from the government sector were adapted and incorporated into the research to guide the methods used to answer the three research questions corresponding to the three phases of research within the study: (1) what are the funding goals and objectives of the Affiliate?; (2) what allocation scheme does the organization use to address these goals and objectives and select programs for funding?; and, (3) to what extent do the programs funded by the Affiliate have potential long-term impact? ^ Within the first stage of the research, document reviews of the Affiliate's mission-based documents and bylaws and interviews with organizational and community informants revealed a highly latent constellation of broad objectives that were not formalized into one guiding document, thus creating gaps in management and governance. Within the second phase of the research, reviews of grant applications from the 2008-2009 funding cycle and interviews with employees and volunteers familiar with the funding process revealed competing ideas regarding resource allocation in light of vague organizational documents describing funding goals and objectives. Within the final stage of the research, these findings translated to the Affiliate selecting programs with highly varying potential long-term impact with regards to addressing goals and objectives relating to breast cancer education, screening, diagnostics, treatment, and support. The resulting performance assessment framework, consisting of three phases of research utilizing organizational documents and key informant interviews, demonstrated the importance of clearly defined funding goals and objectives, reference documents and committee participation within the funding process, and regular reviews of potential long-term impact for selected programs, all supported by the active participation and governance of a funder's Board of Directors.^

「アラブの春」後の移行期過程 -- 帰結を分ける諸要因

Diverging outcomes are unfolding in the post-Arab Uprising countries' transitional processes. In January 2014, Tunisia successfully adopted a new constitution based on a consensus of the opposing political parties and factions. In contrast, Egypt abolished one constitution and hastily instituted another in a time span of slightly more than a year. Yemen has announced the final document of the National Dialogue Conference in the same month. Libyans finally voted for the long awaited and disputed elections of the Constitutional Drafting Committee in February 2014. The paper picks up three factors which seem to be influential in determining the modality of transitional political process in the four Post-Arab spring countries. The first is the initial conditions of the transitional politics.. Differences in the way the previous regimes collapsed are analyzed to illuminate the continuity and break of the ruling institutions and state apparatus. The second factor is the type of the interim government. In line with Shain and Linz typology, provisional, power-sharing, caretaker, and international interim government models are applied to clarify the types of interim governments in each four countries' different phases in transitional politics. The third is the "rules of the game," particularly those pertaining to the constitutional process. Who set what kind of rules and how are to be considered in each of four countries and possible influences of each set of the rules of the game to the diverging results of the transitional politics are considered.

Affect and the Problem of Evil

A central aspect of the problem of evil or the argument from evil is the intensity or quantity of suffering. This quantity is conceived of as something objective and fixed. But because our experience is in part constituted and interpreted by our effectual orientation, there is no such objective quantum of suffering. But where there is no objective quantum of suffering, the argument from evil collapses. Here we begin by examining the connection between the philosophical and existential dimensions of the problem of and argument from evil as suffering. Next we consider the role of the affect in the constitution and interpretation of experience generally, together with implications for the argument from suffering. Third, we look at how a key affectual element of the argument from evil might undercut that argument. And finally, we consider a proposal to categorize suffering as a species of moral or spiritual failure, as affectually wrong.

“Fall” and Redemption in the Thought of Martin Heidegger and Jacques Lacan

This dissertation examines and develops Martin Heidegger’s concept of “falling” as a significant historical-philosophical principle. Falling, however, is primarily understood as a concept of the early Heidegger, whereas I argue that Heidegger continues to rely upon it, both explicitly and implicitly, throughout his career. Falling is a description ofphilosophical and Western history, known as metaphysics, and the description of man’s relationship to Being. Thus, falling relates to the most significant streams in Heidegger’s later thought, too, including the truth of Being, the death of God, the gods, the overcoming of metaphysics, and meditative thinking. I then reinterpret the traditional theology of the Fall narrative from Genesis in light of falling as philosophical concept, extending Heidegger’s own “destruction” of Western metaphysics in relation to one of its grounding myths. I move on to demonstrate the significance of a falling understanding in a rereading of the death of God and the end of metaphysics by examining Heidegger’s engagement with Nietzsche. I conclude by incorporating Jacques Lacan’s psychoanalysis as a further extension of Heidegger’s discourse on falling, showing that the subject’s discourse and relationship to the truth of Being is at the core of his constitution and neurosis.