Economics and the treatment of AIDS: a preliminary assessment

This paper applied cost-effectiveness analysis to the use of drug therapy in the treatment of AIDS. The empirical approach adopted overcame the facts that the samples of patients had varying clinical prognoses, had variable entry dates into the samples and, because AIDS is a terminal disease, had variable exit dates. Holding these variables constant, administration of the drug AZT proved to be a less costly alternative than other existing palliatives for AIDS. The sub-sample of patients treated with AZT had lower hospitalization costs, lower caring costs and sufferers had an increased ability to continue to participate for longer as economically active members of society.     

The law and economics of sycophancy

Tullock (in: Rowley (ed) The selected works of Gordon Tullock, Liberty Fund, Indianapolis, pp 399–455, 2005) was skeptical of the presumed economic efficiency of the common law, as adversarialism, apparently inherent to common law procedures, allowed for and was prone to litigiousness. Common law litigations accord to patterns of rent-seeking, as litigants invest ever more resources to assure victory. This paper asks if viable institutional solutions can emerge to resolve the problem Tullock identified. I survey the historical development of the term sycophancy within ancient Greek law as a revealing case study. Though a relatively innocuous pejorative in contemporary parlance, the term’s etymological roots stem from a formative process of ancient legal and institutional change within Athenian Greece. In the wake of specific legal reforms that expanded the scope of governmental authority under Solon (born 638–558 BCE), citizens were given explicit financial incentive to report violators of newly implemented public laws. Thereafter, social stigma surrounding third party legal representation leveraged the term sycophancy in reference to prosecutors motivated by private interests over the public welfare. Forgone social status and eventually formal criminal sanction emerged as offsetting differentials against the incentives of sycophancy.     

Greater curvature antral flattening: A radiologic sign of NSAID-related gastropathy

We have occasionally encountered patients on nonsteroidal antiinflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) in whom double contrast barium studies revealed persistent flattening and stiffening of the distal greater curvature of the stomach. We therefore performed a study to determine the frequency of this finding in patients with NSAID-related gastropathy. Twenty-one cases of erosive gastritis, gastric ulcers, and/or gastric scarring associated with a known history of NSAID use were reviewed by two radiologists who made a joint decision regarding the presence or absence of greater curvature antral flattening. This finding was seen radiographically in five of the 21 patients (24%). Four of the five patients with antral flattening had associated erosions or ulcers in the gastric antrum. The remaining patient had antral flattening as an isolated finding. Our experience suggests that flattening of the greater curvature of the distal antrum, particularly if associated with erosive gastritis or gastric ulcers, is a useful radiologic sign of NSAID-related gastropathy.     

Compensating for unforeseeable damages in torts

The doctrine regarding unforeseeable damages in a contract was established in the well known case of Hadley vs. Baxendale. According to the judgement, a plaintiff cannot be compensated for unforeseeable damages in an incomplete contract unless he informs the defendant of the possible unforeseen contingency beforehand. In this paper, I extend the argument to the tort case in which it is hardly possible to communicate between a plaintiff and a defendant before an accident occurs. In the case of the sequential bilateral accident in which the victim’s care level is observable to the injurer, the victim’s care level can be a signal of the unforeseen contingency. I mainly discuss the implementability of the social optimum by the contributory negligence with dual standard of care enabling the communication between the parties.     

LPAC项目在我国实施的现状与问题——对西部地区LPAE项目的调查

文章介绍了LPAC项目在我国西部地区的实现现状，并就有代表性的地区进行了具体分析。肯定了LPAC项目的积极作用：同时，也指出了实施过程中存在的问题，并提出了建议。     

Impacts of meat product recalls on consumer demand in the USA

The impact of meat product recall events on consumer demand (beef, pork, poultry, and other consumption goods) in the USA is tested empirically. Beef, pork, and poultry recall indices are constructed from both the Food Safety Inspection Service's meat recall events and from newspaper reports over the period 1982–1998. Following previous product recall studies, recall indices are incorporated as shift variables in consumers’ demand functions. Estimating an absolute price version of the Rotterdam demand model, findings indicate that Food Safety Inspection Service's meat recall events significantly impact demand, and newspaper reports do not. Moreover, although elasticities related to recall events are significant they are small in magnitude relative to price and income effects. Any favourable effects on the demands of meat substitutes for a recall are offset by a more general negative effect on meat demand. The general negative effect indicates a shift out of meat to non-meat consumption goods.