Investigation of trace inorganic elements in street doses of heroin

Sixteen trace elements found in 309 street heroin samples, piped water and contaminated water were determined using inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry. All the street heroin samples were found to contain high levels of sodium, a reflection of the use of sodium bicarbonate during heroin synthesis. Additionally, this element was also found to be one of the potential contaminants acquired from the piped water. Calcium could be derived from lime while iron, aluminum and zinc could have come from the metallic container used in the processing/cutting stage. The levels of these elements remained low in the heroin and it could be due to the dilution effects from the addition of adulterants. Statistical validation was performed with six links of related heroin samples using principal component analysis to find the best pretreatment for sample classification. It was obtained that normalization followed by fourth root showed promising results with 8% errors in the sample clustering. The technique was then applied to the case samples. Finally, the result suggested that the case samples could have originated from at least two major groups respectively showing unique elemental profiles at the street level.     

The Rise of Public–Private Partnerships in China: An Effective Financing Approach for Infrastructure Investment?

The rise of public‐private partnerships (PPPs) in China has spurred heated debates about their purpose and effectiveness. This article traces the fluctuation of China's PPPs over several decades and finds that PPPs have played a supplementary role in China's infrastructure investment, as a response to the pressures of fiscal shortfalls and government debts. The resurgence of PPPs in recent years aims to bridge the infrastructure gap and alleviate ballooning local debts. These expectations, however, are hard to realize. China's PPPs mainly involve state‐owned enterprises and place increasing financial burdens on the government. The central government has taken measures to attract private sector investment to mitigate the financial risk, but the prospects for PPPs remain unclear.     

Disability and support relationships: What role does policy play?

Very little is known about how relationships between people with disabilities and their paid support workers are positioned in policy. With the policy shift toward choice of provider, individualised approaches, person centredness and self‐directed funding, the nature of their relationship assumes a more prominent role in the quality of support practice. The policy analysis in this article explores the extent to which current disability policy acknowledges, promotes, or diminishes the relationships between people with disabilities and workers, in their organisational context. It uses Honneth's conditions for recognition—love (cared for), rights (respected) and solidarity or social esteem (valued)—to understand how policy positions mutuality in the relationship. The policy review applied a three‐stage process: categorisation of policies, textual analysis and content analysis to policy documents at four levels—international, Australian federal, state and organisational in two case studies. The analysis revealed that while a rights framework is explicit in most policies, the emphases on the conditions for recognition within a relationship between people with disabilities and workers are compromised in instructional policies that attempt to manage the tension between choice and risk, particularly at the organisational level.     

论侵权责任法对调整医患关系的价值

为了改善长久以来医患之间不和谐的关系,侵权责任法确认了医患双方平等的法律地位,确立了过错责任原则为主,过错推定原则为补充的归责原则,明确规定医疗损害赔偿采用普通民事赔偿制度,客观地规定了医疗机构不承担民事赔偿责任的免责事由,充分维护了医患双方的权益,对解决医患纠纷必将起到积极的促进作用。同时也应注意侵权责任法也有不足之处,须有一些配套措施来保证其贯彻与实施。     

The potential of urinary androstdiene markers to identify 4-androstenediol (4-ADIOL) administration in athletes

Doping control laboratories accredited by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) require criteria that allow endogenous steroids to be distinguished from their synthetic analogues in urine. Methodology based on "looking outside the metabolic box" was used in this study to identify diagnostic urinary markers of 4-androstenediol (4-ADIOL) administration. Androst-2,4-diene-17-one and androst-3,5-diene-17-one are proposed to be formed in urine from acid-catalyzed hydrolysis of 4-ADIOL sulfoconjugate, a major phase II metabolic product of 4-ADIOL. The presence of these markers in the routine gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) steroid screen was suitable to identify samples requiring confirmation by gas chromatography-combustion-isotope ratio mass spectrometry (GC-C-IRMS) - to measure the carbon isotope ratio (δ(13)C) of the androstdiene markers and confirm their likely synthetic origin based on depleted (13)C content.     

锦标赛体制、晋升博弈与地方剧场政治

政治锦标赛体制是中国政府官员的一种压力性激励范式与不容选择的政治生态。行政发包并进行量化考核、绩效排名与择优提拔,是政治锦标赛体制的主要表现形式。但实地调查表明,基层政府官员晋升往往是前台与台后多重原因作用的结果。派系关系、政治背景、社会网络等后台因素往往能左右基层干部的晋升。文章以一个县级市的乡镇干部为观察对象,检验了官员激励分析范式———锦标赛体制在基层地方官员晋升竞争中的解释力,重点对地方官员晋升博弈研究提供一个初步的描述类型学,认为推选博弈、排名博弈与借势博弈是地方官员晋升博弈的三种基本类型。本文初步提出了一个地方官员晋升决定因素的剧场分析模型,并指出,在政治锦标赛体制下,民主集中制在未来地方官员的选拔、任用中的积极作用将日益凸显。     

绿色GDP、低碳新政与环境治理

众所周知,生态治理是一个永恒的学术议题和实践课题。洪涝干旱、沙尘肆虐、气候异常等等都是全球环境危机的预兆,也昭示着单纯追求GDP和资源密集型的“中国式经济增长”是终结的时候了。实际上,环境问题的实质仍然是发展问题,只有遵循科学发展观、不断减少碳排放才能最终防治生态危机和解决环境难题。在当下中国,建构绿色GDP路线图、实施低碳新政、强化环境治理是实现经济社会可持续发展的必由之路。其中,合理的政策设计和强力的公民参与是经济一社会一生态良性互动以及绿色中国图景下的必然行动逻辑。     

论海域使用权流转制度的完善——以《海域使用管理法》修订为视角

海域所有权归属于国家,是构建海域使用权流转制度的前提条件。完善海域使用权流转制度具有极其重要的现实意义。《海域使用管理法》对海域使用权流转制度的规定存在诸多不足,如没有规定海域使用权的出租、抵押和出资等问题,因此需要对该法进行修订,使之与《物权法》相协调。