Gender,migration and care deficits: what role for the sustainable development goals?

ABSTRACT

This article explores migration to higher income countries in light of collective commitments to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and argues that domestic social protection and labour market policy will need to be modified to meet these commitments. We look primarily at women in care work, using a broad definition of care that includes home help, domestic work and health care. We argue that the failure to recognise and value unpaid care work has created a sustained labour demand for women migrant care workers in many of these labour-importing countries. Increasingly, immigrant women are being imported into host economies to care, often in informal settings, and frequently engaged by private households, without full access to social protection and labour rights. The consistent application of SDG goals 5 and 8 and their linking to existing labour rights norms and conventions could simultaneously address care deficits in home and host countries and protect the rights of care workers in labour-importing countries and ensure that migrant workers are able to claim these rights.     

American College Health Association

Abstract

Objective: The purpose of this cross-sectional investigation was to examine (1) gender differences in osteoporosis-related knowledge and beliefs and (2) if these beliefs could predict vigorous physical activity behavior in university students. Participants: Male (n = 176) and female (n = 351) university students participated in the study. Methods: Participants completed self-report measures of osteoporosis knowledge and health beliefs and vigorous physical activity. Results: Regardless of gender, osteoporosis knowledge was relatively poor. Women reported higher knowledge, perceived susceptibility, perceived severity, and calcium barriers, and lower exercise self-efficacy than men. Regression analyses showed that for women, perceived susceptibility, health motivation, and exercise self-efficacy predicted vigorous physical activity, whereas for men, exercise barriers was the only predictor. Conclusions: Gender differences in osteoporosis health beliefs appear to be greater in older adults than college-aged students. Interventions designed to increase vigorous physical activity may want to target different beliefs for men and women.     

Exposure to Formaldehyde in Indoor Air

Trends in formaldehyde concentrations to which residents are exposed are reviewed, as are the means for assessing these exposures. Concentrations as high as a few ppm encountered in manufactured housing during the 1970s were eliminated after the Housing and Urban Development (HUD) 1984 ruling came into effect. The pressed-wood product industry, and its trade organizations, have made concerted efforts to comply with the ruling. Moreover, they have imposed additional voluntary product standards upon themselves intended to be applicable to a range of pressed-wood products wider than that defined in the HUD standard. Quarterly product testing on arbitrarily selected products shows a general lowering of emission rates with only a few percent of products now being above the HUD level. Measurement of ambient indoor levels of formaldehyde has been largely replaced by testing to assure conformance to product standards. The loweremitting products on the market, if used in mobile home construction and furnishing, will expectantly produce formaldehyde levels not exceeding 0.1 ppm, except under conditions of unusually high temperature and humidity. Recent studies implicate household dust as a significant carrier of bound formaldehyde. In a few instances, old urea-formaldehyde cavity wall insulation has become friable and particles have blown into living areas. Future health assessments might need to consider this additional pathway of potential exposure.     

Hoofbeats and heartbeats: equine-assisted therapy and learning with young people with psychosocial issues – theory and practice

The practice of equine-assisted therapy and learning (EAT/L) to deliver psychosocial interventions to young people is a rapidly growing field. However, recent reviews have cited a need for further documentation of a theoretical foundation and evidence of outcomes of these programmes. This paper is a theoretical discussion of psychotherapeutic theories and models that the authors understood as being relevant and giving substance to the application of EAT/L at a Therapeutic Horsemanship centre in the UK. It also describes and defines the practice of EAT/L at the centre. Philosophical and psychological theories/models of Non-Violent Communication, Object Relations, Play and Dramatherapy, Mindfulness practice, and Attachment Theory, all set within a person-centred and relationship-based approach employed at the centre were examined and illustrated in the form of client case material. The authors report the central role relationship plays between client-horse-therapist and horse-handler in the building of trust and resolution of the impact of trauma. The paper highlights a need to carry out well-designed empirical studies with different client groups in the field of EAT/L in order to gain more insight into this growing field.     

Achieving the sustainable development goals: surfacing the role for a gender analytic of migration

ABSTRACT

This paper forms the introduction to the Special Issue: Achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) through the Gender, Migration and Development Nexus. This article takes a broad look at the changing dynamics of migration and development through the feminisation of globalised labour flows and the gendered experiences of categorisation by states and multilateral bodies, and the gender-specific vulnerabilities and outcomes of human mobility. We illustrate how a more nuanced approach to the SDGs that incorporates gender and migration is needed in order that policy and programming designed to achieve the 2030 Agenda is accurately informed and appropriately framed. In this paper and this Issue, we argue, that it is necessary to confront the SDGs with a deeper understanding of gender, migration and development in order to illuminate the interconnected globalised and transnational realities of gendered labour flows. With this aim in mind, we look to civil society participation and the role of the existing human rights architecture, as the key to ensuring that a deep, wholistic and ultimately universal application of the SDGs can be achieved addressing those populations whose rights to development have been undermined by dint of their migration or flight and applying a gender analysis to our understanding of migration and development.     

Semi‐Parametric Models for the Multivariate Tail Dependence Function – the Asymptotically Dependent Case

Abstract. In general, the risk of joint extreme outcomes in financial markets can be expressed as a function of the tail dependence function of a high‐dimensional vector after standardizing marginals. Hence, it is of importance to model and estimate tail dependence functions. Even for moderate dimension, non‐parametrically estimating a tail dependence function is very inefficient and fitting a parametric model to tail dependence functions is not robust. In this paper, we propose a semi‐parametric model for (asymptotically dependent) tail dependence functions via an elliptical copula. Under this model assumption, we propose a novel estimator for the tail dependence function, which proves favourable compared to the empirical tail dependence function estimator, both theoretically and empirically.     

Scheduling professionals in the retail pharmacy chain

To control operating costs, a zero-one integer programming model is developed to assist pharmacy staff scheduling decisions. Variable scheduling needs are met by the assignment of relief (mobile) pharmacists to help or temporarily replace full-time pharmacists. Assignments of relief pharmacists over a two-week planning horizon are determined with consideration given to variations in wage rates and travel costs together with the underlying corporate, contractual and operating constraints. The developed model has been applied with considerable success using data collected from a business district in the US located in northern Louisiana related to a national retail chain pharmacy. Forecasting the number of chain retail outlets in the near future has been also performed and the results obtained argue in favor of adopting the model by the entire chain.