WHO initiatives to increase access to treatment in developing countries

In mid-2002, the World Health Organization (WHO) estimated that some six million people with HIV/AIDS in developing countries are currently in need of life-sustaining antiretroviral (ARV) therapy, but that only 230,000 have access to these medicines, half of whom live in one country, Brazil. The WHO believes that, with a concerted international effort to expand access to HIV treatment and care, three million people could have access to ARVs by the end of 2005. A number of recent initiatives provide some useful tools toward reaching this goal.     

China: government issues licences for three antiretrovirals

The Chinese government has approved the production and sale of at least three generic antiretroviral drugs used in treating people living with HIV/AIDS. The first applications were filed in late 2001 and approved in August and September 2002.     

Policy feedback and public opinion: the role of employer responsibility in social policy

This study extends the literature on policy feedback and explores the extent to which public attitudes reflect learning from past government initiatives. We analyze the ways in which feedback mechanisms affecting public attitudes may differ from those earlier identified in the literature. We apply this general analytic framework to help explain variation in public attitudes toward private employer involvement in health care, explore possible causal pathways, and offer some preliminary empirical tests of these hypotheses. There are different levels of public support for the notion of employer obligation involving medical care, long-term care, and the treatment of substance abuse. Our evidence suggests that lessons about the performance of institutions in each of these policy domains represent the most important effect of existing policy on public attitudes. Furthermore, these differences correspond to what one would expect based on our model of policy feedback and cannot be explained by other plausible sources of policy legitimacy.     

What Happened to Queensland's Disaster Management Arrangements?: From ‘Global Best Practice’ to ‘Unsustainable’ in 3 Years

The Queensland Police and Community Safety Review (PACSR) 2013 headed by Mick Keelty was tasked by the Queensland government to examine the State's emergency management practices and processes. Commissioned before any crisis, the PACSR was still collecting evidence when extensive flooding occurred across many regional centres of Queensland in 2013. It was the subsequent management of this event, and selected evidence from earlier inquiries that underpinned many of the findings in the final PACSR report. Keelty recommended institutional and organizational restructuring that included the abolition of a department, and the tasking of the fire and rescue service with additional oversight and audit functions. PACSR argued too much emphasis was placed on relationships, which made disaster management in Queensland potentially unsustainable in the longer term. Some of the findings replicated those of earlier inquiries (O'Sullivan 2009; QFCI 2012), including the apparent reluctance by police to implement communications systems that are interoperable with other emergency agencies. This reluctance to embrace new technologies indicates institutional and cultural barriers to reform. Despite this, the Police and Fire and Rescue services have been given additional responsibilities by the Newman government, based on Keelty's recommendations. PACSR did not appear to evaluate some of the best practice aspects of the 2010–2011 flooding event, whereas some suggest the report had a predetermined element to it (Byrne 2014). In finding that too much emphasis was placed on informal relationships and networks in 2013, and concentrating on structural reforms instead, this paper argues that the PACSR discounted many features that current crisis literature notes as important for a successful disaster management response.     

Selected Federal Research Grants for the Fiscal Year 1987

Selected Federal Research Grants for the Fiscal Year 1987     

Death penalty attitudes and the tendency to convict or acquit

Three studies examined whether attitudes toward the death penalty were related to conviction or acquittal proneness. They were not, even in a case where it was clear that the prosecution was asking for death. Two questions asked whether attitudes toward the death penalty were related to changes in the threshold of guilt or in the amount of evidence required to find guilt when death as compared to life imprisonment was the potential sentence. They were so related, but answers to such questions were unrelated to verdicts in a death case. In one study, strong opponents of the death penalty were no different from others in attitudes toward attorneys and witnesses, in recollection of the facts of a trial, or in their subjective impressions about the trial. The basis of any attitude-behavior relation in this area is questioned.