Emergency powers,anti-corruption,and policy failures during the COVID-19 pandemic in Puerto Rico

This paper explores how the use of emergency powers by the US and Puerto Rican governments exacerbated the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and manufactured the conditions for furthering the multilayered economic, legal, political, and humanitarian crisis affecting Puerto Rico since 2006. The paper discusses three cases. First, it examines how the multiple declarations of the state of emergency, and its constant renewals, produced contradictory public health policies. Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020, the Puerto Rican government has issued over 90 executive orders aimed at addressing the emergency, producing an unclear, contradictory, and unequal emergency management policy. Second, the paper focuses on the impact of the passing of Law 35 on April 5, 2020, which imposed severe penalties on those who disobeyed executive orders. As a result, hundreds of Puerto Ricans were arrested, fined, and incarcerated for violating the issued order. Third, the paper studies how, citing the presence of corruption, the Puerto Rican government implemented anti-corruption and anti-fraud policies that made it more difficult for those most in need of it—mainly poor and racialized individuals, as well as immigrants and working women—to access Pandemic Unemployment Assistance. Thus, the paper argues that emergency policies designed to address the pandemic, punitive governance, and anti-corruption and anti-fraud policies undermined Puerto Rico's capacity to handle the pandemic, exacerbated its impact, and created an unequal recovery scenario.     

Lessons from urban risk assessments in Latin American and Caribbean cities

This paper draws on the results from a recent World Bank-funded project designed to inform policy-making and climate change adaptation planning in small and medium-sized cities in Latin America and the Caribbean. The focus was on floods and landslides, which are the two most common climate-related risks in cities across the region. The project allowed the application of the Urban Risk Assessment (URA) tool developed by the World Bank and the drawing of valuable lessons which may also be applicable to the many methods and tools available for climate change adaptation planning in the rapidly urbanising cities of developing countries.     

Cardiac Inhibitory Reflex as a Cause/Mechanism of Death

The role of cardiac inhibitory reflex as a potential cause of death is still a matter of debate. This study reports two cases of death under unusual circumstances. Case 1 corresponds to a man found hanging where the role of ligature compression of the carotid sinus became relevant as a possible explanation of death. In Case 2, the participation of a vasovagal syncope was clearly triggered by the laryngoscopic procedure. It is proposed that cardiac inhibitory reflex should be taken into account in those cases of unexpected death, which fulfills the following three criteria: (i) The investigation of the circumstances of the death is consistent with a hypothesis of cardiac arrest. (ii) A typical triggering peripheral stimulus is present. (iii) The performance of a complete autopsy cannot rule out the participation of a cardiac inhibitory reflex in the cause of death.     

Biological variability of the minutiae in the fingerprints of a sample of the Spanish population

The minutiae, a term coined by Galton to refer to the small peculiarities present along the length of every isolated ridge, or characteristic points, a term used primarily by the Spanish Police Scientists, have an inter- and intrapopulation variability which has not been extensively studied. However, these peculiarities constitute the bases for the fingerprint identification of individuals in the field of criminology. Using the adhesive paper and graphite method, the fingerprints of 200 students, 100 males and 100 females, with ages ranging between 20 and 35, have been taken at the University of Alcala (Madrid). From this sample, the distal phalanx of the index finger of the right hand has been studied. The total count of the minutiae, as well as that of each different type, was made of the entire print area, and inside and outside of a circle with a radius of 18 ridges. The highest frequencies were of ridge endings, followed by bifurcations and convergences, all others appearing with frequencies of lower than 5%. The distribution of the minutiae was not homogeneous for the area of the fingerprint (inside and outside the circle). In the study of minutiae statistically significant differences were found between the sexes, and between the different types of general pattern (arches, loops, and whorls).     

Elemental analysis of white cotton fiber evidence using solution ICP-MS and laser ablation ICP-MS (LA-ICP-MS)

The purpose of this research is to investigate a method for the forensic elemental analysis of cotton fibers for the purpose of increasing the discrimination between otherwise similar cotton evidence using microwave digestion inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) and laser ablation inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS). A quadrupole ICP-MS and UV laser ablation (266 nm) instruments were used for the analysis. A cotton standard reference material (IAEA V-9) was used to validate the developed methods producing good accuracy with typically <10% bias and good precision (typically <5% RSD) for the element list: ²⁵Mg, ²⁷Al, ⁵⁵Mn, ⁵⁷Fe, ⁸⁸Sr and ¹³⁷Ba. It was found that the LA-ICP-MS method resulted in improved precision over the solution ICP-MS method. Twenty-four raw cotton samples and five white cotton T-shirts were analyzed with the developed methods. It was also found that all the raw cotton samples from different sources were distinguishable from each other, as were all the cotton T-shirts resulting in zero type I errors and zero type II errors for the pairwise comparisons. The laser ablation method was slightly faster than the solution-based analysis, requiring 3 h for the laser analysis of 10 samples vs. 3.5 h for the solution analysis, including sample preparation time. One additional advantage of the LA-ICP-MS method was the extremely low sample consumption (1.75 μg were consumed vs. 250 mg for the solution-based method) and the fact that the LA samples are amenable for reanalysis.     

Restraining auto imports: Does anyone win?

The conventional wisdom suggests that import restraints help the protected domestic industry at the expense of consumers. In the longer term, however, trade restraint may encourage foreign firms to adopt new and more threatening business strategies, such as upgrading the quality of their products or moving plants to the United States. If these long-term dynamic effects of restraint are considered, trade restraints may prove harmful to the domestic industry as well as consumers.     

Defense Transformation in Latin America: Will It Transform the Technological Base?

Developing the defense trilemma of choices between autonomy, stability, and global integration, this article analyzes the strategic tension in military acquisition between undertaking technology partnerships versus off-the-shelf purchases of equipment to meet modernization needs in Latin America. The Brazilian case is examined for its lessons in how partnerships can help countries to achieve strategic goals while promoting industrial capacities.