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Assessing Drug Crime Concentrations Across Types of Rural and Urban Areas
No full textCrime is highly concentrated in a small percentage of micro-places, such as street segments. Research indicates that drug crimes might show even higher spatial concentration levels than property and violent crimes. Similarly, studies have shown that hot spots policing interventions for drug crimes are more effective than for other crimes. However, what we know about drug crime concentrations in micro-places is based almost exclusively on urban areas. Differences in crime concentrations in micro-places between rural and urban areas might, in turn, impact the effectiveness and transferability of common intervention strategies. This study addresses these issues by assessing drug crime concentrations in micro-places across diverse geographic area types (i.e., small cities, suburban areas, small towns, touristic, and rural areas). Adapting recent methodological advancements that allow for accurately assessing spatial concentrations for rare events, the study shows that drug crimes are, overall, highly spatially concentrated and can show even higher levels of concentration in some types of less urbanized areas
“It’s a Double-Edged Sword”: Proximal Affinity in Relationships Between Rural Parole Officers and Parolees
No full textRural parole officers and people under their parole supervision indisputably face major challenges as they jointly navigate reentry. Such challenges include obtaining employment, accessing substance use and mental health treatment services, and navigating felony-related stigma. Utilizing 120 interviews conducted with parole officers and people on parole in Wyoming, we argue that proximal affinity – the degree to which individuals relate to and empathize with others based on their perceptions of one another as potential or actual neighbors in community – directly impacts the parole supervision relationship and, when exercised positively, may even help to explain why, despite rural areas’ extremely limited or even nonexistent numbers of reentry services, rural people on parole recidivate less often their peers in more populous areas
An Analysis of Livestock Theft in South Africa (2013-2023): Towards a Deeper Understanding of Livestock Dynamics for Enhanced Countermeasures
No full textLivestock theft poses a significant challenge to the agricultural sector in South Africa, impacting farmers’ livelihoods, food security, and economic stability. This article analyses livestock theft in South Africa for the ten-year period from 2013 to 2023. It draws on existing literature, government statistics, and analyses of livestock theft statistics. The study identifies the key factors contributing to livestock theft, including regional disparities, seasonal patterns, and the involvement of organised crime. Key findings reveal a steady decline in reported cases from the 2018/2019 financial reporting year, even though the number of stolen livestock has remained relatively high. This is indicative of underreporting, livestock theft incidents; closed-circuit television (CCTV) and surveillance measures; that have had an influence on the data. Practical recommendations are made for combating livestock theft, including improving reporting mechanisms; conducting targeted research on regional hotspots; implementing interventions during peak theft periods; fostering stakeholder collaboration; and increased investment in the training and capacity-building initiatives for law enforcement agencies. This article contributes to understanding the complexities of livestock theft in South Africa. It offers actionable recommendations for policymakers, law enforcement agencies, and agricultural stakeholders to address this pressing issue and protect the economic livelihoods of farming communities
The Democratization of Systematic Biology
No full textScience, like other sectors of society, is currently in a period of rapid social and cultural change. Demands for the decolonization and democratization of research culture and scientific data are prevalent. Systematic biology, as the research community that focuses on the existentially important issue of understanding global biodiversity, and as the standard-bearer for a field deeply rooted in colonialist approaches, has a unique opportunity to develop and model a meaningful and actionable vision for systemic change. Because systematics research requires sampling and analyzing planetary biodiversity, it operates within a global arena in which undoing exclusionary norms and practices, and reimagining a new kind of science that builds knowledge collectively, is both possible and potentially hugely impactful. Because of its history, the discipline has the potential to become a powerful model of intentional transformation. Professional systematists work and conduct research across natural history museums, academic institutions, federal agencies, national laboratories, international organizations, and the private sector and they serve as leaders throughout the disciplinary ecosystem; as a result, they are well-positioned to shape cultural transformation. We highlight just one example of a change lever (peer review of proposals) to illustrate this. Beneficial outcomes of such a new era of systematics will be extensive for continued research advances in biodiversity and phylogenetics, and for critical challenges that lie at the science-society-policy intersection
Study Protocol: Autologous Platelet-Rich Plasma (PRP) Therapy in the Treatment of Pyoderma Gangrenosum: A Prospective, Open-Label, Randomized, Split-Ulcer Trial to Evaluate the Efficacy of Platelet-Rich Plasma Therapy in the Treatment of Chronic Pyoderma Gangrenosum
No full textBACKGROUND Pyoderma gangrenosum (PG) presents as an ulceration of the lower extremities with deep, undermining, and violaceous borders. The disease is an orphan disease without any FDA-approved treatments. OBJECTIVE This study aims to evaluate the efficacy and safety of intralesional injectable and topical platelet-rich plasma (PRP) therapy in the treatment of chronic pyoderma gangrenosum ulcerations. METHODS Methodologically, this study will be conducted as a prospective, randomized, open-label split-ulcer study in patients with confirmed PG by PARACELSUS score. In each patient, up to three separate ulcerations will be randomized to receive either monthly intralesional PRP injections or a topical PRP solution at 0, 4, 8, and 12 weeks, while the third target lesion will receive standard wound care only. Patients will be followed up with at 16 weeks, one month after the completion of treatment. The primary endpoint for this study will be the composite proportion of the target ulcers achieving either complete resolution or a 50% reduction in the surface area at week 12. CONCLUSIONS This study intends to demonstrate the efficacy of an intralesional injectable or topical PRP therapy in the treatment of PG. If successful, PRP treatment may offer a new and effective option for patients with this debilitating disease
Disablised or Ablised?: Linguistic Categorisations of Dis/ability in Swedish Print Media Over Time
No full textWhich linguistic labels we use to name ourselves and others – such as disabled and non-disabled – make a difference regarding how we see ourselves and each other. Such labels may also say something about how we view society and the roles of people in it, as illustrated by the choice between people-first and identity-first labels. In the present study, we use a sample of 56,666 articles published by Swedish print media to investigate how the concept and category of dis/ability is referred to and understood in Swedish. The data stretches over four decades, from 1982 to 2019, and is analysed using the two research fields of Corpus Linguistics and Discourse Studies. The study shows that the overall terms to name dis/ability and disablised people in Swedish have changed regularly, while the underlying concepts, structures and ways of categorisation regarding dis/ability remain the same. Dis/ability is shown to be understood along a medical-biological model as located in the individual. Ability is rarely mentioned. These results suggest that any attempts at changing mainstream society's conceptualisations of dis/ability need to involve more work than just replacing outdated or offensive words by new ones. The results also suggest a need for making tacit ableist norms explicit if they are to be challenged
Removing and Rehabilitating the Burangin: South Korean Newspapers' Vagrancy Discourse in Support of State Violence
No full textThe South Korean government used the burangin [vagrants] label to justify their massive wave of forced institutionalizations in the 1980s that resulted in countless abuses and many hundreds of deaths. The survivors' legal battles continue as the state, while no longer arresting so-called "vagrants," has never rectified the crimes of that period. Universal deinstitutionalization remains a controversial proposition in South Korea as the public is generally unaware of fundamental problems inherent in the practice of institutionalization itself. This paper uses critical discourse analysis to examine the discourse of vagrants in South Korean newspapers in the 1980s. While police cracked down on alleged vagrancy, the news media constructed the vagrant as an unsightly object, a threatening figure, and a target for rehabilitation. This article also discusses oppressive power mechanisms around this discourse which connects to issues of ableism and disability
Lessons Learned from Developing, Implementing, and Evaluating Interventions for Workplace Trauma in Rural and Tribal Settings
No full textTrauma exposure is ubiquitous in victim service professions, which are broadly defined here to include social and community service, criminal justice, and healthcare. As a result, individuals, and the trauma-informed organizations they work for, are often desperate to reduce the myriad of negative consequences associated with trauma exposure in the workplace. Unfortunately, using a trauma-informed approach to developing, implementing, and evaluating effective interventions is challenging. These difficulties are exponentiated in rural and tribal areas. The aim of this study is to provide practical information and recommendations based on nearly a decade of experiences studying trauma and victim services in both rural and tribal contexts. This study draws on qualitative interviews, focus groups, quantitative surveys, and randomized controlled trials with rural and tribal workers who engage with traumatized others or potentially traumatic materials. Five lessons are offered that highlight a variety of challenges that arise when developing, implementing, and evaluating interventions needed to mitigate the impacts of workplace trauma
Barriers to Providing Services Experienced by Rural Domestic Violence Service Centers in Pennsylvania During the COVID-19 Pandemic
No full textResearch examining how the COVID-19 pandemic affected assistance provided to domestic violence victims has produced mixed results with specific evidence about the effects on rural service providers in the United States being quite rare. The objective of this research was to survey Pennsylvania’s rural domestic violence service providers to identify their ability to respond to the challenges of the pandemic with expectations of guiding service providers to be better prepared for managing public health and other states of emergencies. A mixed-methods approach was used to assess five aspects of domestic violence responses including agency services, staffing, funding, clients, and interagency collaboration. The findings suggest respondents’ greatest concerns about providing services during the pandemic were related to funding, staffing, and client access to services. Policy recommendations based on these findings include establishing greater advocacy for service providers, creating victim-focused interagency advisory boards, evaluating and improving a supportive workplace culture, and reducing restrictions on the use of funds during a state of emergency