Jails and Public Health Service Delivery and Empirical Knowledge: The Impact of Jail Population “Flow”

Time/flow is a decisive variable when proposing public health interventions in jail populations and settings. The present paper argues that jail flow affects the types of public health interventions achievable in ways not acknowledged generally by public health/medical researchers. The paper explores how public health interventions vary among jail populations in terms of “flow” and how they are affected by a “period” effect. Interventions that will be effective and reach a substantial portion of the jail population are dependent upon the point in the jail processing process. In turn, the variables that affect the speed of population flow through the jail setting also influence who will be served by public health interventions.     

Watch for those fragments of evidence: the use of an automatic timepiece to help correlate a helicopter crash site from the Vietnam War

This case study illustrates the use of the date function on an automatic wristwatch to help identify a Vietnam War helicopter crash site. The location of a crash incident can sometimes be uncertain because of inadequate or inaccurate wartime records and the passage of time. Artifacts recovered from a prospective crash scene are regularly used to correlate the loss incident. In this case study, a recovered automatic watch displayed a date 2 days later than the reported loss incident. Although the date conflicts with the aircraft crash incident report, it is observed that a fully wound automatic watch continues to work for c. 2 days after movement of the watch ceases. Thus, the watch's date in fact correlates with the aircraft crash incident report. It is noted that automatic watches may also be used to date scenes of crime.     

Service utilization in a cohort of criminal justice-involved men: implications for case management and justice systems

In the era of re-entry, a great deal of attention has been paid to the ‘risk-need-responsivity’ model. Most attention to the utilization of services designed to meet need has focused on post-release behaviors. However, little attention has been paid to the pre-incarceration utilization of services that might influence receptivity to post-release utilization. Using constructs borrowed from health services utilization, the current paper examines the associations among CJ-involvement, social and health services utilization, and health status in a cohort of CJ-involved men living in the community. Results from the current cohort, combined with those of previous research, suggest that follow-through on services by released individuals’ remains problematic. Suggestions for future research and questions about the role of criminal justice agencies in improving follow-through are raised.     

Limitations in assessment of mucosal healing in inflammatory bowel disease

An emerging parameter to define the effectiveness of new therapeutic agents in clinical trials,and by extension,for use in day-to-day clinical practice has been labeled mucosal healing.It has been hypothesized that complete healing of the intestinal mucosa in inflammatory bowel diseases should result in reduced disease complications,reduced hospitalization and reduced surgical treatment.By implication,the natural history of inflammatory bowel disease might then be altered. Measurement of mucosal healing,how...     

Advising Ministers – The Special Problem of Defence

Successive Australian Defence Ministers have been frustrated and occasionally embarrassed by the quality of advice and information provided to them by the Defence organisation. Decades of reviews and reorganisations have failed to find solutions to the special difficulties that Defence faces in providing accurate, timely information and advice to ministers across the broad spectrum of their responsibilities. This article argues that there are multiple explanations for the concerns that are frequently expressed about its policy advisory capacity – most of which are inherent to Defence organisations around the world. While the Defence culture of secrecy is partly responsible, other factors such as the scale of Defence's operations, the multiple cultures that exist within it (military, civilian, and intelligence) that make coherence harder than in more homogenous departments, the long‐time horizons of defence planning as well as the high costs of procurement, must also be considered. The erosion of trust between the organisation and minister has been exacerbated by the intense scrutiny of the media that overburdens ministers and adds another layer of complexity to their role. As history shows, there are push and pull factors that continue to embroil ministers in the minutiae of defence difficulties, while the complexity and scale of operations will undoubtedly continue to impact on the timeliness of advice.     

Union participation in economic policy making in France,Italy, Germany and Britain, 1970–1993

This study uses a specially‐developed measure of union participation in economic policy making to classify and compare the historical experiences of France, Italy, the Federal Republic of Germany and Britain between 1970 and 1993 in order to present a clearer view of the variability of union participation in economic policy making in these countries over this period than has been available up to now. It is found that union participation was concentrated in certain areas of economic policy, in particular labour market policy, and that even high levels of participation were not necessarily linked to union agreement on wage restraint. Over the period as a whole, participation was highest in Italy and lowest in Britain and France, but varied considerably over time as well as between countries. These variations were clearly linked to whether the Left was included in the government of the day as well as to the nature of the national union movements.     

Maritime security in the United States: Latent threats and latent vulnerabilities

Americans and their government are seemingly unconcerned about the possibility that maritime facilities and personnel might be at risk to armed violence. Not only are current maritime security efforts minimal, they feature a curious dichotomy: one thrust is directed toward occasional acts of terrorism, the other toward coastal defense in wartime. Despite a manifestly more interactive world marked by the ready availability of powerful, mobile weapons, no serious efforts have been directed toward protecting maritime facilities and personnel in the United States against special operations or unconventional warfare. This indifference reflects the prevalence of the Clausewitzian paradigm in America's attitude toward war and the country's historical experience with coastal defense in the wars of this century. The fragmented structure of civil and military protection available to protect ports and other facilities suggests that protection could not be quickly upgraded in the face of a rapidly‐developing threat.