Suchergebnisse

As demonstrated by the case of the Indian state of Assam, in this paper I argue that ethnic insurgencies that generally present themselves as expressions of 'people's power' can, paradoxically, at times find themselves challenged by expressions of 'counter people's power' by the very same people they claim to be liberating. I then go on to show that civilian resistance against the prominent United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA) insurgents in Assam has taken on multiple forms, and is particularly separated by a rural-urban divide. The aim of civilian resistance in rural areas is tactical: it is aimed not necessarily at ending insurgency but simply at reducing abuse and insecurity in people's everyday lives; sometimes this takes a violent turn, even ending in the deaths of insurgents in the hands of civilian protesters. In Assam's urban areas, civilian resistance is generally more ideological, and has a longer history than its rural counter-part. It primarily takes the form of non-violent civil-society initiatives – protest meetings, peace rallies, media interventions, public denouncements, candlelight vigils, newspaper and Internet petitions against violence, etc. Typically, these are aimed at ending the insurgency and reaching a sustainable peace settlement. While such acts of civilian resistance might not necessarily herald a new breakthrough in Assam's insurgency scenario, they do hold the potential to force both insurgents and security forces to observe restraint, to reduce the insurgents' social legitimacy, to get compensated by the government for army atrocities against civilians, and to restore the Assamese people's genuine aspirations into the peace process – just as counterinsurgency forces are gaining strength and pushing the insurgents towards the negotiating table.

This research seeks to establish a conceptual understanding of the extent to which group interactions of cross-cultural workforces affect organizational performance in Malaysian small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in the information and communication technology (ICT) sector. Drawing on qualitative case study experiences of ICT SME workforce comprising owners and managers, team leaders, employees and clients, it attempts to understand if culturally diverse teams, through social interaction, exert a positive or a negative effect on team effectiveness. Three separate groups of stakeholders were interviewed over a period of one year who provided divergent perspectives on diversity and team effectiveness. Simultaneously, participant observation techniques were extensively used to gather insights from team-building sessions, annual dinners, new staff induction and other informal events organized by the SMEs under study. The study concluded that though homogeneous sub-groups within cross-cultural workforces teams performed well in delivering technical solutions in the ICT sector, cultural differences created social interaction barriers, particularly communication obstacles, with clients as well as within the team which often hampered work effectiveness. Additionally, the dialectical and ambivalent nature of the technical and social needs of team composition comprising both expatriates and Malaysians provides an interesting arena for further investigation in a wider quantitative survey study to validate the negative outcomes of social interaction on cultural diversity and to contest these theories with positive outcomes as postulated by new organization theories such as informational diversity theory.

Purpose of reviewWe reviewed the studies published in 2012-2013 that focused on re-emerging and emerging injection and noninjection drug use trends driving HIV risk behaviors and transmission in some parts of the world.Recent findingsAlthough HIV incidence has declined in many countries, HIV epidemics remain at troubling levels among key drug-using populations, including females who inject drugs (FWIDs), FWIDs who trade sex, sex partners of people who inject drugs, young people who inject drugs, and people who use noninjection drugs in a number of low-income and middle-income countries such as in Central Asia, Eastern Europe, Southeast Asia, and parts of Africa.SummaryHIV epidemics occur within the contexts of global economic and political forces, including poverty, human rights violations, discrimination, drug policies, trafficking, and other multilevel risk environments. Trends of injection and noninjection drug use and risk environments driving HIV epidemics in Central Asia, Eastern Europe, Southeast Asia, and parts of Africa call for political will to improve HIV and substance use service delivery, access to combination HIV prevention, and harm reduction programs.

We reviewed the studies published in 2012-2013 that focused on re-emerging and emerging injection and noninjection drug use trends driving HIV risk behaviors and transmission in some parts of the world.Although HIV incidence has declined in many countries, HIV epidemics remain at troubling levels among key drug-using populations, including females who inject drugs (FWIDs), FWIDs who trade sex, sex partners of people who inject drugs, young people who inject drugs, and people who use noninjection drugs in a number of low-income and middle-income countries such as in Central Asia, Eastern Europe, Southeast Asia, and parts of Africa.HIV epidemics occur within the contexts of global economic and political forces, including poverty, human rights violations, discrimination, drug policies, trafficking, and other multilevel risk environments. Trends of injection and noninjection drug use and risk environments driving HIV epidemics in Central Asia, Eastern Europe, Southeast Asia, and parts of Africa call for political will to improve HIV and substance use service delivery, access to combination HIV prevention, and harm reduction programs.

Purpose of reviewWe reviewed the studies published in 2012-2013 that focused on re-emerging and emerging injection and noninjection drug use trends driving HIV risk behaviors and transmission in some parts of the world.Recent findingsAlthough HIV incidence has declined in many countries, HIV epidemics remain at troubling levels among key drug-using populations, including females who inject drugs (FWIDs), FWIDs who trade sex, sex partners of people who inject drugs, young people who inject drugs, and people who use noninjection drugs in a number of low-income and middle-income countries such as in Central Asia, Eastern Europe, Southeast Asia, and parts of Africa.SummaryHIV epidemics occur within the contexts of global economic and political forces, including poverty, human rights violations, discrimination, drug policies, trafficking, and other multilevel risk environments. Trends of injection and noninjection drug use and risk environments driving HIV epidemics in Central Asia, Eastern Europe, Southeast Asia, and parts of Africa call for political will to improve HIV and substance use service delivery, access to combination HIV prevention, and harm reduction programs.

Purpose: Rigorous adaptation methods are needed to revise existing evidence-based behavioral interventions for implementation for new target populations, revised/updated outcomes, new delivery modalities, recent advances, and new technologies. We describe an adaptation method designed to overcome the real-world challenges of having very limited existing expertise, resources, and time. Method: This adaptation method and accompanying visualization tool ("Deconstruction/Reconstruction Matrix") preserves theoretical mechanisms of behavior change, accounts for challenges in utilizing new technologies, and strengthens clinical processes, with an emphasis on safety. Results: The adaptation of an in-person HIV behavioral intervention for sexual and gender diverse men in Kazakhstan to one delivered remotely via telecommunication and social media technologies exemplifies the process and strengths of the method, concomitantly resulting in recommendations for adaptation and implementation of mobile health (mHealth) and digital health interventions. Discussion: This method allows researchers and clinicians to adapt interventions rapidly and rigorously and to benefit from new technologies.

Intimate partner violence (IPV), HIV, and substance use are serious intersecting public health issues. This paper aims to describe the Social Intervention Group (SIG)'s syndemic-focused interventions for women that address the co-occurrence of IPV, HIV, and substance use, referred to as the SAVA syndemic. We reviewed SIG intervention studies from 2000 to 2020 that evaluated the effectiveness of syndemic-focused interventions which addressed two or more outcomes related to reducing IPV, HIV, and substance use among different populations of women who use drugs. This review identified five interventions that co-targeted SAVA outcomes. Of the five interventions, four showed a significant reduction in risks for two or more outcomes related to IPV, substance use, and HIV. The significant effects of SIG's interventions on IPV, substance use, and HIV outcomes among different populations of women demonstrate the potential of using syndemic theory and methods in guiding effective SAVA-focused interventions.

Abstract
Background
Syrian refugee women face health care disparities and experience worse pregnancy outcomes, including miscarriage. We investigated risk factors for miscarriage in Syrian refugee women living in non-camp settings in Jordan to identify targets for interventions.

Methods
We analyzed data from Women ASPIRE, a cross-sectional study of gendered physical and mental health concerns of 507 Syrian refugee women (≥ 18 years old) living in non-camp settings in Jordan. We recruited women using systematic clinic-based sampling from four clinics. We limited our analyses to women who had a history of pregnancy and whose most recent pregnancy was single, took place in Jordan, and ended in term live birth or miscarriage (N = 307). We grouped the women by the primary outcome (term live birth or miscarriage) and compared the sociodemographic and clinical characteristics of the two groups. We used Pearson's χ2 test or the Mann–Whitney U test to obtain unadjusted estimates and multivariable binomial logistic regression to obtain adjusted estimates.

Results
The most recent pregnancies of 262 women (85%) ended in term live birth and another 45 (15%) ended in miscarriage. Since crossing into Jordan, 11 women (4%) had not received reproductive health services. Of 35 women who were ≥ 35 years old, not pregnant, and did not want a (or another) child, nine (26%) did not use contraception. Of nine women who were ≥ 35 years old and pregnant, seven (78%) did not plan the pregnancy. The adjusted odds of miscarriage were higher in women who had been diagnosed with thyroid disease (aOR, 5.54; 95% CI, 1.56–19.07), had been of advanced maternal age (aOR, 5.83; 95% CI, 2.02–16.91), and had not received prenatal care (aOR, 36.33; 95% CI, 12.04–129.71). Each additional previous miscarriage predicted an increase in the adjusted odds of miscarriage by a factor of 1.94 (1.22–3.09).

Conclusions
We identified several risk factors for miscarriage in Syrian refugee women living in non-camp settings in Jordan. The risk factors may be amenable to preconception and prenatal care.

AbstractWe assess the effect of CHARM, a gender equity and family planning counseling intervention for husbands in rural India, on men's gender ideology. We used a two‐armed cluster randomized control trial design and collected survey data from husbands (n=1081) at baseline, 9 months, and 18 months. We used a continuous measure of support for gender equity and a dichotomous measure of equitable attitudes toward women's role in household decision‐making. To assess differences on these outcomes, we used generalized linear mixed models. After controlling for socio‐demographic factors, men who received the CHARM intervention were significantly more likely than men in the control group to have equitable attitudes toward household decision‐making at 9‐months follow‐up; there was a non‐significant difference between the groups for the measure of support for gender equity. For household decision‐making, differences were not sustained at 18‐months follow‐up. Given the role of husbands' gender ideology in women's contraceptive use, the CHARM intervention represents a promising approach for challenging root causes of women's unmet need for contraception.

Purpose: This paper examines differences in attitudes, stigma, and discrimination towards people living with HIV (PLWH) in needle and syringe programs (NSPs) in Kazakhstan to help inform HIV care interventions in these settings. Method: We collected data on HIV/AIDS attitudes using a modified Health Policy Project Standardized Brief Questionnaire with two subscales: attitudes within the health facility environment in a facility caring for PLWH, and opinions about PLWH. Results: Outreach workers were significantly more likely than nurses to report health professionals disparaging PLWH, and having stigmatizing attitudes towards PLWH. Outreach workers LWH were significantly more likely to report HIV discrimination in the NSP, and male staff was significantly more likely to have negative opinions of PLWH. Conclusions: Assessing different staff attitudes of nurses versus outreach workers, male versus female staff, and HIV positive versus negative staff and conducting follow-up training may decrease stigma and improve attendance at harm reduction programs.