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World Leaders Must Take Action To Support Commitments To Lower Maternal Mortality, Opinion Piece Says
"I stood up and applauded for women everywhere when I heard the news" that the United Nations Human Rights Council, including the U.S., "recognized maternal death as a human rights issue," CARE President and CEO Helene Gayle writes in an Atlanta Journal-Constitution opinion piece. Gayle writes that governments for the past 15 years "have failed to meet the commitments made and targets set to reduce the more than half a million maternal deaths every year."According to Gayle, preventing maternal death "requires three well-coordinated actions: sustain political leadership, secure adequate res and strengthen health systems." She adds that the resolution "is a positive step" but that it is "only effective if it translates into action." She continues, "It"s great to see the Obama administration places women and girls high on the agenda," adding that many members of Congress also support these issues.Reducing maternal mortality "requires significant res," Gayle writes. She adds, "To be blunt, an estimated global commitment of $39 billion over 10 years is needed to make significant progress." Such a commitment would be "an investment in women, their families and the economic productivity of nations," according to Gayle."The cost of not investing is far greater," Gayle continues. She notes that women "do two-thirds of the world"s work and produce nearly 60% of the world"s food." In addition, "children who lose their mothers are 10 times more likely to die in childhood than children with mothers," and maternal and newborn deaths "represent an estimated annual loss of $15.5 billion in productivity," according to Gayle. "Clearly, other development goals cannot be met without healthy mothers," she adds.She continues that the "most tragic and infuriating point" is that the "death of a woman in childbirth is one of the most inexcusable deaths on earth." Because high maternal mortality is a "barometer of weak health systems, often reflecting the low status of women," strengthening health systems to improve maternal health will therefore enable the system to "address other health needs," Gayle writes. She adds that countries such as Bangladesh, Ethiopia and Peru have improved mortality rates "through four lifesaving programs: family planning, skilled and culturally sensitive care during pregnancy and childbirth, emergency care for complications and postpartum care."Gayle writes, "The U.S. can spearhead a comprehensive maternal health action plan and, by doing so, set an example for world leaders to join and invest in." She concludes, "The actions we take now can make maternal death a problem of the past and not one of our children"s future" (Gayle, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 7/10).
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Article In Medical Decision Making: FDA Ignores Critical Information On Home HIV Tests
The FDA is ignoring critical information in deciding whether to approve an over-the-counter, rapid HIV test for home use, according to a recent article in the journal Medical Decision Making (MDM) which is published by SAGE.
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Campaign Countdown For Voices Of Industry
The UK"s life sciences companies have just two days remaining to tell the Government what it can do to help them succeed, as medical and healthcare industry specialist MedilinkWM brings its Voices of Industry Campaign to fruition.
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Making Waves: LSU's WAVCIS Increases Modeling Capabilities

LSU"s WAVCIS, or Wave-Current-Surge Information System for Coastal Louisiana, has a few new tricks up its sleeve in preparation for the 2009 hurricane season. Drawing from a pool of scientific talent at the university, across the nation and Europe, WAVCIS now offers graphic, easy-to-understand model outputs projecting wave height, current depths and tracks, salinity ratios and water temperature measurements that not only provide state-of-the-art guidance to emergency management officials, but also give federal and state agencies such as the United States Navy, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the National Weather Service, National Hurricane Center and Louisiana Department of National Res new and improved ways to test their own modeling accuracy. "I believe WAVCIS is likely the most comprehensive program in the entire nation," said Gregory Stone, director of both the WAVCIS program and the Coastal Studies Institute and also the James P. Morgan Distinguished Professor at LSU. "We now have 60 to 84 hour advance forecasting capabilities due to our satellite link-ups with NOAA and our supercomputing capabilities. Because of these advancements, we are in much better shape for the 2009 hurricane season to provide valuable information than we were in the past." WAVCIS operates by deploying equipment in the depths of the Gulf of Mexico. Currently, they have sensors attached to numerous oil platforms. Instruments are attached to towers on the platforms and allow meteorological measurements - air temperature, wind speed and direction, visibility - to be made; state-of-the-art oceanographic sensors are placed underwater and on the sea floor. Advanced technology, including the Acoustic Doppler Profiler, an instrument that Stone"s group has helped perfect in real time with the private sector, provides a very comprehensive overview of current velocities from the sea bed to the surface in addition to wave conditions on the sea surface. "In a normal weather situation, WAVCIS links with the satellites and retrieves up-to-date information every hour. This information is then immediately supplied to computer models at LSU"s WAVCIS lab and the data are posted on the WAVCIS Web site," said Stone. "However, during a hurricane or other extreme weather events, we have the capacity to increase the frequency of these link-ups. We won"t have the luxury of waiting an hour during the approach of a hurricane - it"s critical that we can see what"s going on out there in 15 to 30 minute intervals in order to accurately assess the situation." The WAVCIS group, a component of LSU"s world famous Coastal Studies Institute, has sensors all throughout the Gulf of Mexico. In fact, most of the equipment used by WAVCIS is developed and maintained in-house at the Coastal Studies Institute"s fabrication shop. Through a close and reciprocal relationship with NOAA"s National Data Buoy Center, WAVCIS can also access that group"s sensors, giving the system a gulf-wide look at emerging trends in waves and currents, which can be very important during the approach of a tropical cyclone. "Things such as the maximum wave height, wind speeds and storm surge, will play an integral role in issues concerning public safety," said Stone. "For example, the development of certain currents, such as the Loop current in the Gulf of Mexico, allows for almost immediate intensification of storms. That"s why having an easy-to-understand and comprehensive end product was so important to my team and the Coastal Studies Institute, for example the Earth Scan Lab and the Southern Regional Climate Center, during the development stages. When it"s crunch time and people are nervous, we want the facts to be clear." In addition to being a very active research group and providing graduate and undergraduate students with hands-on opportunities in an internationally-acclaimed lab, WAVCIS also provides other entities with the opportunity to test their own modeling accuracy. "By looking at the models they developed and then comparing them to ours and our measurements offshore, they can determine how accurate their models currently are and go about fine-tuning if necessary. This strengthens our knowledge of the oceanographic and coastal environment. Given the vulnerability of, for example coastal Louisiana and the oil and gas infrastructure in the Gulf of Mexico to erosion and hurricane impacts, it is important that the Federal Government, State of Louisiana and the oil and gas industry continue to support this effort," Stone said. WAVCIS models are available on http://wavcis.csi.lsu.edu/index.asp. Ashley Berthelot Louisiana State University


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