New ways of making shopping?

by Victor Cherubim  -   Feb 19, 2019

Feb 19, 2019

We are told that education is an experience in learning. Instead of being forced to learn something children are not interested, it should become a cycle of exploration. The sheer joy of discovery is what learning, if not life today, is all about?

Learning at an individual pace rather than being one of many in crowded schools is being trialled out in many parts of the world. As smart ones jump grades and weaker students can grasp concepts at their pace and ease, the question of catching up with the brightest or the comparing of the weakest, is no longer the view of educationists. They are experimenting on finding the right learning pattern for children of all ages.

Strategies for learning

Children differ from adults in their learning pattern, but there are also surprising common features across learners of all ages.

A study of young children has provided some interesting insights of children as learners. It was common thought that infants lack the ability to form complex ideas. Most psychologists were of the view that “a new born’s mind is a blank slate on which the record of experience is gradually impressed”. It was further thought that language is the obvious prerequisite for abstract thought and in its absence a baby could not have “knowledge”.

But challenges to this idea have been vented. Armed with new methodologies, psychologists began to accumulate data about the remarkable abilities that young children possess that is in stark contrast to older thesis.

The Swiss psychologist, Jean Piaget observed that infants actually seek environmental stimulation that promotes their intellectual development.

After Piaget, others studied how new born began to integrate sights and sound and explore their perceptual world.

As information processing theories began to emerge, the mind became the metaphor as the computer, information processor and problem solver.

Although a great deal of children’s learning is self-motivated and self-directed, while others like parents, teachers serve as guides, so too powerful tools notably TV, now the mobiles have come into play. A great deal of assisted learning has come into prominence, whether it is face to face, or through the electronic media and related technology.

The method of visual expectation    

 Infants and even children will look at things they find interesting. Gaze patterns have been analysed to determine comprehension patterns of visual events. Studies have demonstrated what infants are capable of perceiving, knowing and remembering. As a result of this research, the methodology of infant understanding of the physical, the number and language have become remarkable.

Without delving into all the positive outcome of the learning process, let me introduce you to the process of learning and mastering a language.

Learning a language

Children have the opportunity for learning a new language, whether it is the mother tongue or a second language, because they can use context to figure out what someone must mean by various sentence structure and words. A child could determine the general meaning of “mango”, “eat” and “throw”. Similarly, if a mother says, “get your shirt” while pointing to the only loose object (a shirt) on the floor, the child begins to understand the meaning of “get” and “shirt”. Language is learned or rather acquired in an effortless way through action, by demonstration.

“The child uses meaning as a clue to language, rather than language as a clue to meaning” said MacNamara in 1972.

Say we want to learn English?

The fun way of learning English is not by the method of learning grammar, what are verbs, nouns and pronouns, but by “Search Word” and practice. Listening to words and searching their meaning and repeating the word over and again, is the first step to language learning.

Learning Words has to be fun. It must become a pastime, it must become a game.

Relating words by association, is the name of this game. The time to play this game

Is called: “English Time”. The start of this time is when they imitate their teacher or when they listen and learn, when the observe the coordination between mouth movements and speech –lip movements synchronised with sounds, it becomes interesting, and when it is interesting the child wants to practice this “Word Sound”

and gets a kick out of saying it over and over again, in jest. This continual physical action is called “practice”. A well-known language strategist, Janellen Huttenlocher (1996) has shown the fastest way to learn a language is by practising it as an ongoing and active process, not merely passively watch TV.

Another strategy for learning a language and used also to improve memory performance is called “clustering” or organising disparate pieces of information into meaningful units, to remember words and their usage. It is called by another name as “organising knowledge.”

From this view of learning and development we may come to conclude that learning is development and development is also learning.

The relationship between learning of English and go shopping at Lidl supermarket?

Lidl is the relatively new and highly competitive German supermarket chain of 280 stores all over Britain. In keeping with its philosophy of innovation, it has recently introduced a “Fun Size” supermarket trolley in its stores to temp children not to be bored while their parents shop. Kids often accompany parents during their shopping sprees and kids want action, pushing shop trolleys. Size and steering is difficult.

As well as getting kids engaged, in fact keeping them distracted, and parents to be more relaxed with their purses, Lidl has introduced these Kid’s Trolleys each named after items of fruit and vegetable in the store for the week, aiming to get children eating more healthy food, rather than sweetie diets.

It’s not knowing where this will end?

India Has a Lesson for Trump: National Emergencies Are a Disaster for Democracy

Indira Gandhi's Emergency damaged Indians' rights — and gave the opposition a cause to unify against.

U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during a Rose Garden event at the White House on Feb. 15 in Washington, DC. (Alex Wong/Getty Images)

BY RUDRA CHAUDHURI

 | FEBRUARY 21, 2019, 2:00 PM
After declaring a national emergency on Feb. 15, U.S. President Donald Trump said: “I didn’t need to do this, but I’d rather do it much faster.” He was referring to the speed with which he could now initiate special powers to access the funds needed to build a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border. Clearly, expediency shaped the president’s decision—and will shape the legal challenges to it, too.

 

Despite Trump’s self-serving reasons for declaring a national emergency, such executive actions are hardly unusual in the United States. Since 1976, when the National Emergencies Act was passed, this legal instrument has been used on numerous occasions to block properties owned by those contributing to conflicts in Libya and Somalia, support the nonproliferation of weapons of mass destruction, prevent financial deals between U.S. entities and Iran, and take action when democracy was deemed to be undermined in Belarus and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The main difference, of course, between the past and the present is the brazenness with which Trump has circumvented congressional authority on just about every legislative turn since he came into office in 2016.

A national emergency can be a dangerous tool—as India discovered during the Emergency period, from 1975 to 1977. India’s Emergency was far more unprecedented than Trump’s—and far more threatening to democracy. But it shows how much damage such powers can do in the wrong hands.
India has declared a state of emergency only three times. The other two were both military crises, but the Emergency itself was a result of what the government, then led by Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, considered a threat to its security because of “internal disturbances.” A combination of factors led to the declaration, including rising food prices and economic distress, street protests organized by leaders of a fast-growing opposition who accused Gandhi and her supporters of widespread corruption, the government’s forceful treatment of 400,000 striking railway workers, and an impending court ruling on the 1971 elections.

In declaring an emergency under Article 352 of the Indian Constitution, Gandhi blamed the “hidden hand” of the CIA in stoking internal unrest.

 But whatever she said in public, one of her main purposes was to avoid a court order—which accused her of electoral malpractice in the 1971 elections—so that she could remain in power. The use of such powers to get around a legal threat hasn’t yet happened in the United States, but with Trump facing multiple possible accusations and regularly attacking his own intelligence agencies, it doesn’t seem out of the range of possibilities.

There are, of course, stark differences between India in the 1970s and the recent declaration in the United States. The Indian Emergency Proclamation Order immediately suspended fundamental rights, censored the press, and allowed the state to make mass arrests under the cover of a legal order that was passed to maintain internal security in 1971, months before a war between India and Pakistan broke out. More than 900 such arrests were made in the first 24 hours of the Emergency. Twenty-six political organizations were banned. According to Amnesty International, by the end of the Emergency period, more than 100,000 Indians had been incarcerated. None of this is the case in the United States, where, despite Trump’s repeated threats against the media, the press remains unmuzzled.

With these caveats in mind, India’s 21-month Emergency comes with some possible lessons for Americans.

First, the Emergency called into question the foundation of the social contract between the citizen and the state, as well as that between the government and the opposition. Simply put, the awesome powers held and used by the state once and for all snapped the legitimacy accrued by it in the ballot box. Union workers, thousands of whom were put behind bars, rapidly appreciated the need to link themselves to political parties with the hope of deriving protection in times of crisis.

In the post-Emergency period, barefaced attempts by successive governments to silence the press were justified (at least to themselves) by using the Emergency as an example or a threshold below which state-inspired coercion became acceptable. “It’s not as bad as the Emergency” became the rationale to justify the heavy hand of the state—even when used for nakedly political purposes.

 

But the Emergency also led to the awakening of a political consciousness in India that coalesced in the formation of an opposition to the Indian National Congress. This grouping of disparate actors with varying political associations finally defeated Gandhi in the 1977 elections, soon after her Emergency powers were rescinded. Many of these actors were released from prison only a few weeks before the elections, and their experiences made clear the need for an alternative in India. Some 2,400 candidates fought the election campaign in 1977. Out of 542 seats, 292 were won by the new Janata party.

This was the first non-Congress government in independent India. Its eventual collapse in 1980, as a result of sharp ideological and personal differences notwithstanding, made it clear that India could be governed by a party or a group of parties apart from the Congress. As a result of the Congress’s attempts to mute difference and opposition during the Emergency, a center-right verve in Indian politics quickly electrified a constituency that proved to be decisive in the late 1990s. This is when the Bharatiya Janata Party, also in power currently, led an alliance and formed the government. In short, the Emergency served to catalyze the political right—and to end the dominance of the old order.

That emergencies have a life of their own became clear within the first few months after Gandhi chose to shut down democracy. Congress leaders, both at the center in New Delhi and in the states, used the time to consolidate their political base, with little or no requirement to adhere to the rule of law. Gandhi’s son, Sanjay Gandhi, experimented with a brutal population control scheme, carrying out forced sterilization campaigns in parts of northern India with opaque judicial and legal mandates.
Attempts to consolidate power and run ad hoc public health campaigns were led, as archival documents underline, without the full authority of the prime minister. Gandhi’s “cabal,” as the British Foreign Office argued, “grew out of the need for secrecy.” Soon after, its members began to keep secrets from Gandhi. In sum, while absolutism was engineered by Gandhi, the leader of the nation, it allowed her and several others within her coterie to exercise a form of despotism that temporarily turned parts of India into an Orwellian state.

The Indian Emergency bears little direct parallels to the situation in the United States as yet. But it underlines why, in democratic systems of government, emergency powers, once unleashed, can and potentially will acquire a life of their own. Relying on emergency powers, if done often enough, not only potentially corrodes institutions but can consolidate power in the other end of the political spectrum. The shape such opposition could take in the United States is unclear, but its effects ought not to be disregarded. As India’s Emergency shows, periods of absolutism aren’t blips in democratic history but have long-lasting effects that are not always immediately obvious.

At least 70 killed in major Bangladesh blaze, toll likely to rise

Ruma Paul, Serajul Quadir-FEBRUARY 20, 2019 

DHAKA (Reuters) - As many as 70 people died in a major fire that engulfed several buildings in a centuries-old neighbourhood of the Bangladesh capital, a fire official said on Thursday, warning the toll could climb as fire fighters scour the rubble.

Lax regulations and poor enforcement of rules in impoverished Bangladesh have often been blamed for several large fires that have led to hundreds of deaths in recent years.

The city’s worst fire since 2012 broke out late on Wednesday night in a five-storey building, before spreading to others nearby in the Chawkbazar precinct, parts of which date back more than 300 years to the Mughal period.

“So far, 70 bodies have been recovered,” Julfikar Rahman, a director of the Fire Service and Civil Defence, told Reuters. “The number could rise further as the search continues.”

At least a dozen of the roughly 50 people taken to hospital were in critical condition, Rahman added. Hundreds of distraught relatives thronged the Dhaka Medical College and Hospital to seek missing relatives, witnesses said.

“All of them were crying and desperate,” said a Reuters witness. “Relatives entered the morgue and searched a register for the names of their nearest and dearest.”

About 200 firefighters had battled for more than five hours to contain the blaze in narrow lanes snaking between tightly-packed buildings in an area authorities say is home to more than 3 million people.

Firemen said they struggled to get enough water to douse the flames and had to pump supplies from a nearby mosque.

A dead body is carried out from a burnt warehouse in Dhaka, Bangladesh, February 21, 2019. REUTERS/Mohammad Ponir Hossain

“The area is so congested, there is no wide space or spacious road to easily bring in water,” fire official A K M Shakil Nowaz told Reuters at the site. “We didn’t find any water source nearby, so it took several hours to put out.”

The fire broke out in a building with shops on its ground floor, a warehouse for plastics and flammable material on the first, and homes on three floors above, said Shamim Harun ur Rashid, a local police official.

“It is unclear whether anyone who lived on the floors above is alive,” said Rashid, adding that the cause was being investigated.

Witnesses said the blaze spread after the explosion of gas cylinders in an adjoining restaurant and a parked van.

Hundreds of burnt perfume or deodorant cans littered the road near the partially collapsed building where the fire began, a Reuters witness said.

The fire has revived concern about lax enforcement of building safety regulations.

“This tragic incident happened due to the indifference and callousness of the government, as well as mismanagement,” said Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir, secretary general of the opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP).

Residents had several times urged authorities to relocate the warehouses in the area, but were not heeded, said school teacher Mohammad Hemayet Uddin.

“After the Nimtoli tragedy we urged our local leaders not to allow any more godowns that are a danger for us,” he added, referring to a 2010 fire that killed at least 124.

“We need cooperation to find such illegal godowns as the area is vast and houses thousands of buildings,” Sayeed Khokon, the South Dhaka mayor, told media.

Slideshow (10 Images)

Bangladesh has set up a five-member panel to inquire into the fire, Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan told media, adding that Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina was monitoring the situation.

In 2012, a fire in a garments factory on the outskirts of Dhaka killed as many as 117 people and injured more than 200 in the country’s worst industrial blaze.

Reporting by Ruma Paul and Serajul Quadir; Writing by Euan Rocha and Ruma Paul; Editing by Darren Schuettler and Clarence Fernandez

Facebook gives nod to secret pro-Israel campaign

Facebook gives nod of approval to secretive and deceptive pages set up by a lobby group that collaborates with the Israeli government. Stephen LamReuters


Ali Abunimah Media Watch 21 February 2019

Facebook has banned several pages belonging to such viral media outlets as In the Now because they are affiliates of the Russian-funded network RT – even though these media outlets violated none of the social network’s rules.

Yet The Electronic Intifada can exclusively reveal that Facebook has given a nod of approval to a network of secretive and deceptive pages set up by The Israel Project, a lobby group that collaborates with the Israeli government and with Israel’s military establishment to influence public opinion against Palestinians.

Last week, Facebook took down several pages run by Maffick Media. This came after CNN ran a report that the majority stakeholder of the company “is Ruptly, a subsidiary of RT, which is funded by the Russian government.”

Often featuring reporter Rania Khalek, one of those outlets, In The Now, creates viral videos on current affairs, including this recent one debunking US claims used to justify the Trump administration’s regime change effort in Venezuela:

On a side note, CNN kept asking if I have editorial control at @IntheNow_tweet (I do). The interviewer didn’t believe me. So I asked where Marc Lamont Hill’s editorial freedom was when CNN fired him 4 telling the truth about Israeli occupation of Palestine. Response was crickets

— Rania Khalek (@RaniaKhalek) 16 February 2019

It’s moments like this you should really question why CNN, why the US government and its proxy think tanks are so scared of what people like me and @AnissaNow have to say. These entities really want to shut us up. Why? Because we say things like this pic.twitter.com/xMabspwZcP

— Rania Khalek (@RaniaKhalek) 16 February 2019

Khalek is a former editor and writer for The Electronic Intifada.

Government-linked censorship

As Kevin Gosztola reported for Shadowproof, CNN’s hit piece revealed no violations of Facebook policies by Maffick Media’s pages.

Read More

Malcolm X and Martin Luther King

A portrait of two different voices whose demands for black equality gave rise to gains in American civil rights.

19 Jul 2017 08:02 GMT Racism, United States, Civil Rights

A half-century after their deaths, Martin Luther King Jr and Malcolm X remain two of the world's most revered political activists.

A half-century after their deaths, Martin Luther King Jr and Malcolm X remain two of the world's most revered political activists.

They were both respected leaders of the American Civil Rights movement, struggling for racial equality and freedom. But at the start of the 1960s, the media were constructing a conflict that stirred the civil rights debate: Malcolm X versus Reverend Martin Luther King.

While King advocated non-violent direct action and passive resistance to achieve equal civil rights, Malcolm X was the spokesman for the Nation of Islam (NOI), the black Muslim movement which violently rejected white America and its Christian values, and preached the supremacy of blacks over whites.

He promoted a segregationist approach that sought to instil in blacks a pride in their African heritage, whereas Martin Luther King believed that self-respect would come through integration.

"King was working to take down signs that prevented black people from riding buses where they wanted to, and to ride in trains, public transportation, preventing them from voting, and all of those things that black people were prevented from doing in the south. In the north, blacks always could vote, but as Malcolm said 'You may have the vote but you ain't no voting for nothing because they've already decided that you are not going to have any power'," explains historian James H. Cone.
King once told the press that "the method of non-violent resistance is one of the most potent, if not the most potent weapons available to oppressed people and their struggle for freedom."

However, for Malcolm, turning the other cheek was a weak strategy that was unacceptable.

"Malcolm comes from a black nationalist tradition that does not believe that you can get your freedom, your self-respect, your dignity by simply letting somebody beat up on you, and you do not try to defend yourself. That's why Malcolm emphasised self-defence. But King emphasised non-violence because if blacks had responded, tried to defend themselves, that would have brought the police department down on those demonstrators and whites would have loved to have the chance to kill black people indiscriminately. So King and Malcolm had that tension," says Cone.

Malcolm X regularly criticised King, accusing him of bowing to whites and subjugating blacks to the very culture that had historically denigrated and abused them.


"The white man pays Reverend Martin Luther King, subsidises Reverend Martin Luther King, so that Reverend Martin Luther King can continue to teach the negroes to be defenceless. That's what you mean by non-violent: be defenceless. Be defenceless in the face of one of the most cruel beasts that has ever taken a people into captivity. That's just the American white man," Malcolm X said.

TV was young in the United States and King intuitively understood how to use the medium to highlight a non-violent black protest movement against white racist aggression.

In Washington, King continued his political work with a group of senators sympathetic to his ideas. He opened historic collaborations with the white community - joining the debate on the civil rights draft bill initiated by President John F Kennedy - that culminated in the March on Washington in 1963 and the signing of the Civil Rights Act in July 1964.
64.

Malcolm X versus Martin Luther King Jr

Malcolm X always wanted to meet King, but King never responded to Malcolm's repeated requests for debate. After a hearing about the Civil Rights Act in Washington in 1964, they finally met face to face. Their meeting only lasted a minute, but the images that captured them side by side, both men smiling, became a strong symbol of reconciliation between two stridently different visions of the black cause.

"Those two people Martin and Malcolm, symbolised something that is in all African Americans. Each of us has a little bit of Martin and a little bit of Malcolm in us. Malcolm represents that blackness in us, that sense that we don't want white people messing with us. Malcolm represents that fire, that fight that refuses to let anybody define who we are. King represents our desire to get along with everybody, including whites. Our desire to want to create a society for all people, defined by non-violence, love and care for all people in the society," says Cone.

On February 21, 1965, Malcolm X was assassinated in New York, bringing an end to one of the most famous political debates in the history of black Americans.

Martin Luther King gave his public reaction a few days later: "I think Malcolm X did serve a role, I think he played a role in pointing out the problem, calling attention to it, but his great problem was an inability to emerge with a solution. He had slogans that were catchy and that people listened to, but I don't think he ever pointed out the solution to the problem."

What King didn't know was that in death, Malcolm X would become much more than a rival. He became a memory, a revolutionary consciousness for a generation of young blacks. Chanted in the ghettos, word of his death would resonate like a revenge on King.

On April 4, 1968, Martin Luther King was assassinated in Memphis. A few days later, at his funeral, the black community was not only mourning its national leader three years after the violent death of Malcolm X, it was laying to rest the two dreams that shaped the history of African Americans.
Source: Al Jazeera

Climate change 'cause of most under-reported humanitarian crises'

Report says few headlines sparked by food crises that ravaged Madagascar, Ethiopia and Haiti

A girl eats a food supplement in Ifotaka, southern Madagascar, in December 2018. Photograph: Rijasolo/AFP/Getty Images

Arthur Neslen-Thu 21 Feb 2019

Climate change was responsible for the majority of under-reported humanitarian disasters last year, according to analysis of more than a million online news stories.

Whole populations were affected by food crises in countries ravaged by by drought and hurricanes such as Ethiopia and Haiti, yet neither crisis generated more than 1,000 global news stories each.

In Madagascar, more than a million people went hungry as corn, cassava and rice fields withered under drought and severe El Niño conditions. Almost half the country’s children have been stunted, but their suffering sparked few headlines.

An elderly women waits for food aid in the Warder district in the Somali region of Ethiopia. Photograph: Mulugeta Ayene/AP

Sven Harmeling, the climate change lead for Care International, which commissioned the report, said: “Not only are the people who live in the world’s poorest countries most vulnerable to climate change, but they are also the least equipped to address its increasing impacts. Media must not turn a blind eye to such crises and the role of climate change.”

Asad Rehman, the executive director of War on Want, blamed a “climate change reporting that prefers pictures of polar bears to those we are killing with our inaction”.

He said: “Climate change has long had its fingerprints over untold killer floods, droughts and famines. Unfortunately the people being sacrificed every day to the climate crisis are those least responsible for it. They have been deliberately made invisible because the lives of those with black and brown skins simply don’t matter.”

Around the world, extreme weather events claimed about 5,000 lives in 2018, and left almost 29 million people in need of humanitarian aid and emergency assistance.

A Filipino on a bike passes children in a flooded street in Manila, the Philippines, in 2016. Photograph: Mark R. Cristino/EPA

The Care report links climate change to civil disasters in Sudan, Chad, the Philippines, Madagascar and Ethiopia, and says it played an exacerbating role in Haiti.

Nine of the 10 most neglected tragedies occurred in countries in the AfricaCaribbean and Pacific (ACP) group of states.

Dr Viwanou Gnassounou, the ACP’s assistant secretary general, said: “We try always to show that these disasters are linked to climate change but we have to fight to get our points heard. We have not been very successful until now. The [media] coverage is poor and [reported] in terms of ‘disaster’ – not linked to climate change or its consequences.”

Gnassounou, who is also the ACP’s sustainable development spokesman, said that donor countries sometimes implicitly linked crisis aid to silence about climate change.

“They will never say it formally but it is part of the conversation,” he said. “They prefer that you condemn yourself by saying that you did not have a proper policy to prevent disaster and now you need their support.”

 Thousands of UK students strike over climate change – video

Scientists have tended to be wary of attributing individual weather events to global warming but many are increasingly reluctant to underplay trends in line with climate models.

Last year, the European Academies Science Advisory Council said climate change this decade had been “fundamentally responsible” for driving a 50% increase in flood frequencies and a similar surge in storms, droughts and heatwaves.

In July, the World Meteorological Organisation described extreme heatwave conditions as “consistent with what we expect as a result of climate change”.

Later that month, one of the world’s leading climate scientists, Prof Michael Mann, described accelerating extreme weather events as “the face of climate change”.

However, Dr Friederike Otto, the deputy director of Oxford University’s environmental change institute, added a note of caution. She said: “Not every humanitarian disaster has climate change as a major player. Some are actually being made less likely by climate change. And in some, climate change only plays a minor – if any – role.”

How domestic violence affects women’s mental health

Domestic abuse has lasting effects on a woman's mental health. Source: Shutterstock

 Feb 20, 2019Feb 21, 2019

EVERY week in Australia, a woman is murdered by someone she knows. And it’s usually an intimate male partner or ex-partner.

One in three women has suffered physical violence since the age of 15. In most cases (92 percent of the time) it’s by a man she knows.

Added to this, one-quarter of Australian women have suffered emotional abuse from a current or former partner. This occurs when a partner seeks to gain psychological and emotional control of the woman by demeaning her, controlling her actions, being verbally abusive and intimidating her.

Physical and emotional abuse is not only distressing, it’s psychologically damaging and increases women’s risk of developing a mental illness.

SEE ALSO: Behind closed doors: A tale of ongoing domestic servitude in Malaysia

How violence increases the risk

Women who have experienced domestic violence or abuse are at a significantly higher risk of experiencing a range of mental health conditions including post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), depression, anxiety, substance abuse, and thoughts of suicide.

In situations of domestic violence, an abuser’s outburst is commonly followed by remorse and apology. But this “honeymoon” period usually ends in violence and abuse. This cycle means women are constantly anticipating the next outburst. Women in these situations feel they have little control, particularly when the abuse is happening in their own home.

It’s no wonder living under such physical and emotional pressure impacts on mental and physical well-being.

Abuse could cause its sufferer PTSD. Source: Shutterstock

One review of studies found the odds of experiencing PTSD was about seven times higher for women who had been victims of domestic violence than those who had not.

The likelihood of developing depression was 2.7 times greater, anxiety four times greater, and drug and alcohol misuse six times greater.

The likelihood of having suicidal thoughts was 3.5 times greater for women who had experienced domestic violence than those who hadn’t.

An Australian study of 1,257 female patients visiting GPs found women who were depressed were 5.8 times more likely to have experienced physical, emotional or sexual abuse than women who were not depressed.

Not only is domestic violence and abuse a risk factor for psychological disorders, but women who have pre-existing mental health issues are more likely to be targets for domestic abusers.

Women who are receiving mental health services for depression, anxiety and PTSD, for instance, are at higher risk of experiencing domestic violence compared to women who do not have these disorders.

SEE ALSO: Malaysian woman escapes jail after horrific attack on Indonesian domestic worker

How do mental health services respond?

Although survivors of domestic violence are more likely to suffer mental illness, they are not routinely asked about domestic violence or abuse when getting mental health treatment.

So they’re not provided with appropriate referrals or support.

One study found only 15 percent of mental health practitioners routinely enquired about domestic violence. Some 60 percent reported a lack of knowledge about domestic violence, while 27 percent believed they did not have adequate referral resources.

Often, abuse victims are not provided appropriate referrals or support. Source: Shutterstock

One-quarter (27 percent) of mental health practitioners provided women experiencing domestic violence with information about support services and 23 percent made a referral to counselling.

In the absence of direct questioning, survivors of domestic violence are reluctant to disclose abuse to health service providers. If mental health providers are managing the symptoms of the mental illness but ignoring the cause of the trauma, treatment is less likely to be successful.

Practitioners need to routinely ask women about present or past incidents of domestic violence if they are diagnosed as depressed or anxious, or if they show any other signs of mental distress.

Practitioners should be able to provide referrals to specialist services and need to be adequately trained to respond to those who disclose domestic violence. This means not focusing solely on medical treatment, but also on referrals and support.

By Rhian Parker, Academic Convenor, MAEVe ( Melbourne Alliance to End Violence against women and their children, University of Melbourne. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license.

Sepsis test could show results 'in minutes'

UNIVERSITY OF STRATHCLYDEImage caption-A close-up of the test device

19 February 2019

A new rapid test for earlier diagnosis of sepsis is being developed by University of Dr Damion Corrigan with the microelectrode biosensor device researchers.

The device, which has been tested in a laboratory, may be capable of producing results in two-and-a-half minutes, the Biosensors and Bioelectronics journalstudy suggests.

Diagnosing sepsis can be a complex process.

The UK Sepsis Trust said it welcomed the research but added that no test was perfect at spotting the condition.

It is estimated that 52,000 people in the UK die every year from sepsis, which is a serious complication of an infection.

There is a lot of research going on to attempt to find out what exactly triggers the sometimes fatal reaction involved in sepsis.

The initial problem can be quite mild and start anywhere - from a cut on the finger to a chest or urine infection - but if left untreated can set off a cascade of reactions, from shock to organ failure and in some cases, death.

• The biggest killer you may not know
• Sepsis: What is it - and how to spot it?
• Sepsis: Ambulance call handlers 'must spot condition'

Early diagnosis is key because for every hour that antibiotic treatment is delayed, the likelihood of death increases.

Diagnosis of sepsis is usually based on clinical judgement, body temperature, heart rate, breathing rate, and a series of blood tests.

As soon as sepsis is suspected, broad-acting antibiotics should be given to the patient.

A blood test that aims to determine the best antibiotic to treat the infection can take up to 72 hours.

The new test uses a device to detect if one of the protein biomarkers of sepsis, interleukin-6 (IL-6), is present in the blood.

Dr Damion Corrigan with the microelectrode biosensor device

Dr Damion Corrigan, who helped develop the test, said IL-6 is one of the best markers of sepsis.

"The type of test we envisage could be at the bedside and involve doctors or nurses being able to monitor levels of sepsis biomarkers for themselves."

He said the test would work well in GP surgeries and in A&E to quickly rule sepsis in or out, if it was eventually approved through clinical trials.

Dr Corrigan added that sepsis not only kills people but can also leave them with life-changing problems, such as limb loss, kidney failure and even post-traumatic stress disorder.

The idea is that the device could be implanted and used on patients in intensive care.

Sepsis symptoms

Symptoms in adults:

• Slurred speech or confusion
• Extreme shivering or muscle pain
• Passing no urine in a day
• Severe breathlessness
• It feels like you're going to die
• Skin mottled or discoloured

Symptoms in children:

• Breathing very fast
• Fit or convulsion
• Looks mottled, bluish, or pale
• Has a rash that does not fade when you press it
• Is very lethargic or difficult to wake
• Feels abnormally cold to touch

With early diagnosis and the correct treatment, normally antibiotics, most people make a full recovery.

Source: UK Sepsis Trust

The project's clinical adviser and co-author, Dr David Alcorn, from Paisley's Royal Alexandra Hospital, said the tiny electrode had the potential to detect sepsis and, at the same time, diagnose the type of infection and the recommended antibiotic.

"The implications for this are massive, and the ability to give the right antibiotic at the right time to the right patient is extraordinary.

"I can definitely see this having a clear use in hospitals, not only in this country, but all round the world."

The researchers have applied for funding to develop a prototype device and hope to get commercial interest in taking it forward.

They hope the low-cost test could come into everyday use in three to five years.

Delayed diagnosis of sepsis

Ryan, who contracted sepsis in 2015, lost three stone in weight and struggled to walk after being in a coma

Ryan Sutherland, from Clackmannanshire, ended up in a coma with sepsis, which had been misdiagnosed.

He had felt unwell with a sore throat that got worse, but was told by a doctor it was a viral infection.

"As the week went on, it got worse and by the Thursday it was really bad. My wife took me to the out-of-hours doctor that night and by this point I was really unwell and could barely move. But I was given an anti-sickness injection and then I was sent home."

Hours later he collapsed. He was taken to hospital and suffered two cardiac arrests. His body went into shock with the sepsis and his organs started to shut down.

After eight days in a coma, Ryan woke up and made an almost complete recovery.

"No-one mentioned sepsis, although looking back I had all the symptoms," said Ryan.

"It's hard to diagnose, so if this test had been around it could have made all the difference to what happened with me."

The UK Sepsis Trust estimates that earlier diagnosis and treatment across the UK would save at least 14,000 lives a year.

Dr Ron Daniels, the trust's chief executive officer, said: "Any kind of test that enables us to identify sepsis earlier, before symptoms even present themselves, could help save even more lives and bring us closer to our goal of ending preventable deaths from sepsis.

"Systems like this are so important as, with every hour before the right antibiotics are administered, risk of death increases.

"No test is perfect in the identification of sepsis, so it's crucial we continue to educate clinicians to think sepsis in order to prompt them to use such tests."

Media captionRachel Day was a healthy, happy 29-year-old when she was struck down by sepsis

Update 19 February 2019: This article has been amended to more accurately reflect the stage of development that this new rapid test has reached and the continuing difficulties in diagnosing sepsis.