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Material Wealth (material + wealth)
Selected AbstractsEthical Issues in HIV Research in Poor CountriesJOURNAL OF NURSING SCHOLARSHIP, Issue 2 2001Gladys Mabunda Purpose: To increase awareness of the potential for conducting unethical research in poor nations in the name of scientific inquiry, and to enumerate ethical questions in HIV/AIDS research. Organizing construct: Principles of ethics and ethical analysis in clinical research. Sources and methods: Review of literature on ethical principles of research in developing nations. Findings: People who participate in clinical trials in poor countries often do so because that may be the only way to gain access to health care. However, access to tested drugs beyond clinical trials is not guaranteed. Participants often do not understand the consequences of being research subjects. Conclusions: Conducting research in poor nations requires recognition of ethical issues and maintenance of ethical standards, regardless of material wealth of the countries. Ethical standards also indicate including people from the target population in decisions relating to designing and conducting clinical trials. [source] How to be a Value-Free Advocate of Laissez FaireAMERICAN JOURNAL OF ECONOMICS AND SOCIOLOGY, Issue 3 2005Ludwig von Mises's Solution Ludwig von Mises is often regarded as a "champion" of laissez faire. This characterization seems to contradict Mises's clear statement that economics is value free. The aim of this paper is to resolve this apparent contradiction. We accomplish this by distinguishing, as Mises did, between the advocacy of specific laissez-faire policies and the advocacy of a laissez-faire ideology vis-à-vis the alternative ideologies of socialism and interventionism. Mises argued that the logic of a value-free economics could be used to show that socialist and interventionist policies would not achieve a goal that the socialists and interventionists implicitly or explicitly aim to achieve, that of progress in terms of material wealth for the members of society. Thus, Mises resolved the contradiction by shifting the debate from the welfare analysis of particular policies to a logical analysis of the ends of a particular ideology and the means available to achieve those ends. In a seminal paper in neo-Austrian economics, Murray Rothbard criticized Mises. We analyze Rothbard's argument partly as a means of elucidating Mises's views and argue that Rothbard misinterpreted Mises and quoted him out of context. Rothbard failed to adequately support his claim that Mises held the beliefs that Rothbard attributed to him. Moreover, Rothbard's paper undermined the value freedom that Mises regarded as a crucial characteristic of economics. [source] Blood pressure and lifestyle on Saba, Netherlands AntillesAMERICAN JOURNAL OF HUMAN BIOLOGY, Issue 3 2009Laura E. Soloway During the 20th century, infectious disease morbidity and mortality generally waned whereas chronic degenerative diseases posed a growing burden at the global level. The population on Saba, Netherlands Antilles has recently experienced such an epidemiologic transition, and hypertension was reported to be extraordinarily high, although no prevalences have been reported and relationships with lifestyle factors associated with rapid modernization have not been explored. In this study, a medical and demographic questionnaires, as well as body composition and blood pressure measures were collected from 278 Saban men and women aged 18,91 years. When age and sex adjusted, 48% of the population was hypertensive. Age, BMI, and Afro-Caribbean descent were all associated with higher blood pressures. In a second phase, 124 individuals of the 278 were invited to receive a longer questionnaire on individual exposure to modernizing influences such as travel and education. Higher blood pressure was associated with having lived in fewer different places in the past; those who stayed only on Saba or Statia had higher blood pressures than those who had also lived in more modernized areas. However, this was no longer statistically significant after adjustment for age and BMI. Lifestyle incongruity was positively associated with higher blood pressure in that those with more discord between material wealth and income were more likely to be hypertensive, and this remained statistically significant after adjustment for age and adiposity. In summary, hypertension is highly prevalent on Saba and tended to be associated with greater age, adiposity, Afro-Caribbean ancestry, and lifestyle incongruity. Am. J. Hum. Biol., 2009. © 2009 Wiley-Liss, Inc. [source] Lifestyle incongruity, stress and immune function in indigenous Siberians: The health impacts of rapid social and economic changeAMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHYSICAL ANTHROPOLOGY, Issue 1 2009Mark V. Sorensen Abstract The purpose of this study was to investigate the impact of economic and cultural change on immune function and psychosocial stress in an indigenous Siberian population. We examined Epstein-Barr virus antibodies (EBV), an indirect biomarker of cell-mediated immune function, in venous whole blood samples collected from 143 Yakut (Sakha) herders (45 men and 98 women) in six communities using a cross-sectional study design. We modeled economic change through the analysis of lifestyle incongruity (LI), calculated as the disparity between socioeconomic status and material lifestyle, computed with two orthogonal scales: market and subsistence lifestyle. EBV antibody level was significantly negatively associated with both a market and a subsistence lifestyle, indicating higher cell-mediated immune function associated with higher material lifestyle scores. In contrast, LI was significantly positively associated with EBV antibodies indicating lower immune function, and suggesting higher psychosocial stress, among individuals with economic status in excess of material lifestyle. Individuals with lower incongruity scores (i.e., economic status at parity with material resources, or with material resources in excess of economic status) had significantly lower EBV antibodies. The findings suggest significant health impacts of changes in material well-being and shifting status and prestige markers on health during the transition to a market economy in Siberia. The findings also suggest that relative, as opposed to absolute, level of economic status or material wealth is more strongly related to stress in the Siberian context. Am J Phys Anthropol, 2009. © 2008 Wiley-Liss, Inc. [source] | ||||||||||