Diatoms in forensic expertise of drowning--a Macedonian experience

Results obtained by examination of 22 human cases suspected for drowning, one human case of death other than drowning and several tests on laboratory rats were used as a basis for evaluation of diatom method as supportive in forensic expertise of drowning. The recovery of diatoms from various examined organs, their qualitative and quantitative composition, if properly treated without the possibility of contamination, can be a reliable proof of the time and place of drowning. The priority of organ examination (external microflora determination, lungs, brain, heart (and/or blood), stomach, liver and kidney, and finally bone marrow) is discussed and established as well as the basic future research on cases suspected of drowning, but also on non-drowned victims and laboratory animals.     

Personality traits in suicidal and homicidal subjects with schizophrenia

Paranoid schizophrenia is characterised by an increased risk of suicide and homicide. Little is known about the influence of personality dimensions as determinants for suicidal and homicidal behaviour within this condition. We assessed the differences among suicidal, homicidal and non-aggressive adult male in-patients with ICD-10 paranoid schizophrenia. The clinical assessments included structured psychiatric interviews and reports on harmful alcohol use and suicide attempts. The personality dimensions were assessed with the Big Five Inventory-10. The study recruited 264 patients divided into three groups: suicide attempters (N = 62), homicide group (N = 70), and a comparative control group (N = 132). To examine how the clinical subgroups differed from the comparative sample in the studied variables, a multinomial regression was performed. Each subgroup was considered a nominal outcome variable and the log odds of the outcomes were modelled as a linear combination of the predictor variables. Neuroticism or emotional instability was the only personality dimension that was different among the study subgroups: a lower level of neuroticism was found in the homicide group. Other risk factors such as age, education, relationship status and history of self-aggressive behaviour could potentially distinguish these subgroups of paranoid schizophrenia patients.     

Impact of Financial Crises on Poverty in the Developing World: An Empirical Approach

This article adopts a cross-country perspective to analyse the short term effects of currency, banking and debt crises on the poverty headcount ratio and the poverty gap (as measured by the World Bank), employing multivariate fixed-effects panel data analysis. The findings suggest that currency crises most significantly exacerbate both the incidence and depth of poverty in the short run. Banking crises are associated with an increase in the depth of poverty but not the incidence while there is no direct effect of sovereign debt crises. Given the low level of significance, the results are far from conclusive and offer only partial indications of the crises-poverty nexus.