Summary of Acheiving Stop Tb Partnership Goals free essay sample

However, â€Å"In 2006, the TB pandemic continued to kill 2 million people annually and was growing by 1% each year, despite the World Health Organization also known as WHO having declared it a ‘Global Emergency’ over a decade earlier. † The United Nations has even stated that the goal is to cut the number of TB deaths in half by the year 2015. This is a goal not so easily achieved considering the fact that an estimated 2 billion people are latently infected with tuberculosis worldwide. (Kupferschmidt 1) Tuberculosis is caused from a bacterium called Mycobacterium tuberculosis. M. uberculosis is an obligate aerobe that grows in tissues with a high oxygenated content, such as the lungs. It is a slow growing bacteria that takes anywhere from 12 to 20 hours to generate. The cells are hydrophobic and have high lipid content in the cell wall and tend to clump together. TB is an airborne disease that is spread from person to person by coughing, sneezing, or speaking. We will write a custom essay sample on Summary of Acheiving Stop Tb Partnership Goals or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page Tuberculosis is diagnosed by a simple skin test that if positive will show a reaction to a small quantity of tuberculosis antigens. A positive confirmation can be made by a chest X-ray, and a microscopic examination of a sputum sample. A new significant development in TB diagnosis has been found in Xpert MTB/RIF assay. The Xpert MTB/RIF is made to detect DNA sequences specific for Mycobacterium tuberculosis and rifampicin resistance by polymerase chain reactions. The MTB/RIF test purifies concentrates and identifies targeted nucleic acid sequences in M. tuberculosis genomes which can take about 90 minutes to complete. MTB/RIF assay has met some of the minimum requirements of the governing groups, such as being easily administered by a low skilled technicians and operating in different temperatures with minimal requirement from the test operator. There has also been price reduction availability for countries with the pandemic. (Zumla 819) While MTB/RIF assay seemed to be the miracle answer for TB testing, it still falls short of the requirements set forth by the STOP TB Partnership. For example, the shelf life is half the expected 2 years, high cost of the machine and cartridges to run it and constant electricity make it difficult for key areas. Safe recycling of large amounts of cartridges also remains an environmental concern being that sputum and positive buffers are present in the used cartridges. (Zumla 822) There are 11 new TB drugs on the horizon. Hopefully, by 2015 at least 2 of them will be released for public consumption. The current drug-susceptible TB treatment is the medication called Isoniazid or INH. INH is available worldwide, is relatively inexpensive and is generally well tolerated. INH is used to for latent tuberculosis infection to help kill the dormant bacteria and to reduce the risk of the infection becoming active tuberculosis later in life. This medication is taken for 6-9 months; where as the new drugs that are still in clinical trials would shorten this to 4 months. However, these unfortunately are not available yet. What are really needed to eradicate this disease are TB vaccines. The present TB Vaccine, Bacillus Calmette-Guerin or BCG, is an attenuated strain of Mycobacterium bovis which was introduced in 1922. It is used primarily in children in countries outside the US. Not all administered BCG vaccines have been effective either, only helping with severe childhood versions of TB (ex: disseminated and meningeal). As of 2011, at least 6 TB vaccine candidates were in preclinical trials, with 21 additional next generation candidates in the vaccine discovery phase. A more effective tool for the United States would be a post infection vaccine, due to the vast majority of cases being remote infections. This would nearly eradicate TB in the US. But, one has currently not been created. (Zumla 823) TB has plagued the human race for decades, only improving when social, economical, and general living conditions were bettered. Recent research continues to look for vaccines, diagnostics, and treatments. However, no new trial based vaccine has been introduced since BCG in the 1950’s. The STOP TB Partnership’s goal of lessening the yearly cases of infection by one million is admirable, but so much more needs to be done to control the spread of infection. More people need to be tested and become aware of what a huge problem it currently still is. People know about the disease but many people are not educated about the disease and what the symptoms are until it is too late and have probably already spread it to other people. Despite the years of effort that has been dedicated to TB research, the end still seems to be decades away. Works Cited Alimuddin Zumla, et al. Achieving STOP TB Partnership Goals: Perspectives On Development Of New Diagnostics, Drugs And Vaccines For Tuberculosis. Tropical Medicine International Health 16. 7 (2011): 819-827. Academic Search Premier. Web. 2 Oct. 2012. Alimuddin Zumla, et al. Immunological Biomarkers Of Tuberculosis. Nature Reviews. Immunology 11. 5 (2011): 343-354. MEDLINE with Full Text. Web. 24 Sept. 2012. Kupferschm idt, Kai. Taking A New Shot At A TB Vaccine. Science 334. 6062 (2011): 1488. MasterFILE Premier. Web. 2 Oct. 2012. â€Å"Tuberculosis† Division of Tuberculosis Elimination, 13 Mar. 2012 Web

Free Essays on Essay on Platos Republic

ESSAY FOR THE SELECTIONS FROM BOOK II OF PLATO’S REPUBLIC I think that Plato believed history had little significance. Although he was one of the Greek’s greatest political figures, I do not agree with his point of view. His form of censorship leads to the falsification of history. In Plato’s Republic, Plato talked about censorship. He wanted to change or remove lines from poems that made the gods look petty and cruel, and he would not allow stories that made the gods seem evil to be told in his city. He wanted to take these actions to keep the children and citizens of the city thinking that the gods would not do anyone any harm. His doctrine might sound good, but the censorship of literature leads to another kind of censorship, the alteration of history. Censorship seems to be on the rise again, in our period in history. Modern censorship is in the form of extreme â€Å"political correctness.† Some history books I’ve seen sugarcoat the truth in the name of political correctness. These books made huge massacres and battles involving several countries sound like little skirmishes between a couple of ‘people.’ We can not use the term ‘men,’ because the history books must to be ‘politically correctâ€⠄¢ these days. Some people believe that the term ‘men’ does not include the female portion of the human race. I strongly disagree with Plato’s doctrine regarding the treatment of history. Following his advice would hide the real facts behind historic events and could change their real significance.... Free Essays on Essay on Plato's Republic Free Essays on Essay on Plato's Republic ESSAY FOR THE SELECTIONS FROM BOOK II OF PLATO’S REPUBLIC I think that Plato believed history had little significance. Although he was one of the Greek’s greatest political figures, I do not agree with his point of view. His form of censorship leads to the falsification of history. In Plato’s Republic, Plato talked about censorship. He wanted to change or remove lines from poems that made the gods look petty and cruel, and he would not allow stories that made the gods seem evil to be told in his city. He wanted to take these actions to keep the children and citizens of the city thinking that the gods would not do anyone any harm. His doctrine might sound good, but the censorship of literature leads to another kind of censorship, the alteration of history. Censorship seems to be on the rise again, in our period in history. Modern censorship is in the form of extreme â€Å"political correctness.† Some history books I’ve seen sugarcoat the truth in the name of political correctness. These books made huge massacres and battles involving several countries sound like little skirmishes between a couple of ‘people.’ We can not use the term ‘men,’ because the history books must to be ‘politically correctâ€⠄¢ these days. Some people believe that the term ‘men’ does not include the female portion of the human race. I strongly disagree with Plato’s doctrine regarding the treatment of history. Following his advice would hide the real facts behind historic events and could change their real significance....

Neoottomanism in Turkey and the Role of Turkey in the new formation of Essay - 1

Neoottomanism in Turkey and the Role of Turkey in the new formation of the Arab world - Essay Example Thus, ottomanism transformed into the ideology of pan-Turkism. The Turkish leaders of the late XX - early XXI century, especially Recep Tayyip Erdogan, updated the doctrine of ottamanism-pan-Turkism, turning it into so-called neoottomanism. Modern Turkish leaders advocated the creation of an integrated economic and cultural-linguistic space that has commonality of interests; it is the main essence of this ideology. However, neo-Ottomanism implies the dominant influence of Turkey not only on Turks, but even more - non-Turkic peoples and countries that were part of the Ottoman Empire at different time. The doctrine of "neoottomanism" was not completely comprehended even by its originators. Nowadays a lot of European and American politicians are greatly concerned about the given ideology and they do not want to stay away from it. United States, for example, hatch the plans to create a unified Turkic political space dominated by Turkey, and are interested in supporting the sovereignty of newly independent states of Central Eurasia. A heavy blow to this "subtle pan-Turkism", i.e. neoottomanism, was stroke by the Collective Security Treaty Organization, members of which were two Turkic states - Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and the Islamic one – Tajikistan. Uzbekistan led its own political game for a certain period, but then, joined the CSTO. Turkmenistans foreign policy tends to neutrality at the present time. Under the auspices of the U.S., such projects as The Black Sea Cooperation and GUAM were developed. If earlier the U.S. was more interested in strengthening Turkeys influence on the Balkans, nowadays - on Northern and Southern Caucasus, Crimea, Ukraine, Bessarabia, as well as Syria, Lebanon and Iraq - as vectors, amplifying the Turkish-Russian confrontation. "Political and operational" role of Turkey in these regions is the most attractive for the U.S. But practice shows