Fatal Child Abuse Presenting with Multiple Vertebral and Vascular Trauma

This case study involves the unexplained death of a previously healthy 30‐month‐old child. Reportedly, she was found unresponsive by her foster father following a 2‐hour nap. She was transported to the hospital and died in the emergency room of unknown causes. Blood drawn in the ER showed hemoglobin of 4.3 mg/dL. Postmortem skeletal survey, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of the brain, and retinal examinations were negative. The medical examiner assumed jurisdiction of the body. The autopsy showed massive retroperitoneal hemorrhage, transections of the abdominal aorta, and inferior vena cava, and complete tears of the anterior longitudinal ligament of the spine at C5/C6 and L1/L2 with diastases of the vertebral bodies at the corresponding intervertebral disk spaces. The case is believed to be extraordinary due to both the extent of injury that does not match the reported history and the mechanism of vertebral and vascular injuries.     

Encountering Asia

This article explores the narratives of Filipino medical workers on their encounters with other Asians during their migrant journeys to Singapore. Migrants speak of their encounters with regional cultural diversity and the everyday manifestations of regional political-economic power configurations and inequalities. The narratives show that beyond merely responding to state discourses on how migrants ought to represent the nation-state abroad, migrants attempt, on their own terms, to understand their place in Asia, and the world. Their journeys take place at a moment of social and demographic change as many Filipino medical workers travel across borders to care for aging populations in other Asian countries. The field of care raises complex moral dilemmas for Asians of different ethnic and national backgrounds, and this complicates any simple notion of Asian values. Moments of pan-Asian solidarity, in which friendships are cultivated across national boundaries, are often overridden by experiences of racial and cultural prejudice. Among diverse Asians in Singapore, divisive and hierarchical notions of first world and third world, modern and backward, caring and uncaring are prevalent in everyday judgments of others. Filipino migrants assert their global aspirations and their moral reflections on how to live and care for others; simultaneously they create distance from those who they believe do not share such aspirations and moral views. This article illuminates the transformations in migrant subjectivities as migrants experience and evaluate a range of cultural encounters as medical carers in the region.     

Strengthening Humanitarian Law: what role for Commonwealth countries

This article explores some of the new challenges confronting Commonwealth countries in the context of international humanitarian law (IHL). The very nature of non-international armed conflicts presents new challenges that did not exist in the context of inter-State conflicts, which were conducted in the traditional battlefield with well demarcated boundaries. The point is made that, in addressing the role of the Commonwealth in relation to contemporary IHL issues, a good starting point would be the shared commonalities between the two branches of law, HRL and IHL, notwithstanding their distinct paths of development. There are several important areas that could form the core of Commonwealth cooperation in strengthening IHL, including in the area of legislation, national mechanisms for the implementation of IHL and regional measures to strengthen IHL.     

Pathways to urban citizenship for low-income migrants in São Paulo

Recent waves of migrants are establishing an increasingly visible presence in the urban landscape of São Paulo, both in its centre and its peripheries. Though a city with a rich history of immigration and diversity, the arrival of migrants in recent decades has not been accompanied by specific municipal policies for the migrant population, an absence which affects in particular, low-income migrants. Urban social movements for migration take on the role of attempting to govern migration in the city by providing everyday support to migrants as well as mobilising them as a political group to demand changes on both national and municipal scales; yet these movements have limitations. The paper thus also highlights the agency of migrants in accessing their rights through empowering micro-level social networks and through individual negotiations with legal possibilities. Drawing on examples of institutional, activist and migrant practices in addressing questions of inclusion and exclusion in the city, the paper will trace the multiple and still fragmented ways of articulating rights and developing a sense of urban citizenship as newer waves of migrants join the urban landscape of São Paulo.     

Inpatient aggression by mentally ill offenders: a retrospective case-control study

A retrospective case-control study was conducted examining relationships between patients’ socio-demographic, clinical and admission characteristics and inpatient aggression. Patients aged 18–64?years with a recent offence episode, who were admitted to a regional acute mental health unit, were included as cases (N?=?82), while controls comprised the next available admission, matched for age and gender (N?=?82). The prototypical patient was a young, single male, with a diagnosis of schizophrenia, a history of substance use and previous psychiatric admissions. The majority of cases had a history of aggression and recent offences against public order. They also revealed a higher likelihood of involvement in ‘less serious’ aggressive incidents (e.g. verbal threats or demands) during the index admission. Clinically, knowledge of each patient’s recent offence history, arrival mode and observed characteristics on admission (including any verbal aggression) may be important in the management of subsequent inpatient aggression.