Non-Environmental Cost-Benefit News

Oil, mining and retail companies may bear the brunt of human rights campaigns because of their operations and supply chains in impoverished developing countries. But the banking sector is increasingly coming under scrutiny for its role in financing projects that may involve human rights abuses.


Environmental groups have recently called on banks including Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch and HSBC not to sell bonds worth more than $2bn (£1.1bn) on behalf of the China Development Bank and the China Export Import Bank. They argued the bonds would be used to finance controversial infrastructure projects including the Three Gorges Dam. In subsequent contacts with the financial institutions, the environmentalists have been told the China Development Bank has given an oral assurance that the proceeds will not be used for the dam, says Peter Bosshard, policy director of California-based International Rivers Network. "We would still like to see a written representation from CDB that extends beyond the Three Gorges project," he says. "We would also like to learn how the lenders will monitor the implementation of the assurances made by CDB."


Some pressure groups focus specifically on the financial sector, including BankTrack, an alliance of 15 organisations including Friends of the Earth and the Rainforest Action Network. It monitors the impact of private finance and campaigns for it to be "strictly accountable to society at large". The Bankwatch network in central and eastern Europe scrutinises international financing of projects in the region.


Campaigners are not the only ones turning up the heat. Institutional investors, particularly those involved in socially responsible funds, are asking more questions about governance, ethics and human rights.


The International Finance Corporation (IFC), the World Bank's private sector lending arm, is considering human rights in its update of the safeguards it uses to manage social and environmental risks in developing country projects. "While, two or three years ago, human rights might not have been on the agenda of financial institutions, the landscape is rapidly changing," it says.


Then there is the continuing risk of litigation. Ed Fagan, the US lawyer famous for suing Swiss banks on behalf of Holocaust survivors, is seeking $20bn for victims of apartheid under the US Alien Tort Claims Act. The companies in his sights include Barclays, NatWest and Standard Chartered.


Financial groups are also being scrutinised over working conditions in their own supply chains, especially where jobs are outsourced at home or abroad. HSBC recently came under fire from trade unions over a delay to a promised wage increase for low-paid contract cleaners at its headquarters at London's Canary Wharf. In response, the bank said it could not comment on the pay and conditions of the contract company's staff.


Given these rising pressures, banks cannot afford to sit back and ignore human rights issues, says a new study by KPMG and F&C Asset Management, a European investment manager with £118bn of funds under management. "They are likely to continue to be drawn into the human rights debate, if not willingly, then by default."


Some are already acting. Last month ABN Amro, the largest Dutch bank, disclosed that it would screen countries for their records on human rights and corruption in order to reduce its exposure to high-risk investments. ABN stressed the dilemmas involved in balancing conflicting interests. One example was its decision to back the BP-sponsored oil pipeline across Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey in the face of concerns from pressure groups about the risk to communities and the environment.


The study says the sector's response to its emerging vulnerability over human rights is piecemeal. "Human rights are definitely rising up the corporate agenda, although they are still managed in a largely ad hoc manner and there is little industry consensus on how to tackle the challenges they pose." Key concerns include employee rights, security of staff, supply chain management, litigation, loan default and "reputational risk resulting from being seen to be complicit with human rights abuses committed by customers".


Surprisingly, it says, there is little evidence that banks are systematically including human rights issues in their assessments of sovereign or project risk. "All indications are that financial institutions will have to refine their approach to human rights risk management in the near future."


F&C, newly formed from the merger of F&C Management and Isis Asset Management, says it plans to use the findings in its talks with financial companies about social and environmental risk management. "This study will serve to enhance understanding of the various factors that can affect long-term commercial success and financial valuations," it says.


The report, Banking on Human Rights, examines the practices of nine leading banks, including Barclays, HSBC, Morgan Stanley and UBS. The banks - the others being ABN Amro, Credit Suisse, Rabobank, Royal Bank of Scotland and Standard Chartered - were chosen because of their public commitment to human rights and geographic scope.


The study highlights examples of good practice, starting with an over-arching strategy for managing human rights, led from the top. At Barclays, for example, responsibility for human rights lies with Chris Lendrum, vice-chairman. At RBS, Sir Fred Goodwin, chief executive, is responsible.


Rabobank has an ethics committee chaired by the chief executive. Its strength is its transparency and top-level backing, says the report. Its weakness is that the onus to bring a case lies with individual employees.


One dilemma that the ethics committee handled was over the financing of a trader who dealt in oil from Sudan. The committee agreed the bank should terminate the relationship because oil revenues were fuelling the country's civil war and contributing to massive human rights abuses.


Training for all staff on the relevance of human rights is important, as is specific training for those most exposed to the issue, such as credit officers in high-risk countries, the study says. ABN Amro, for example, ran two-day seminars for project finance staff in three regions on how to implement the IFC's Equator Principles for sustainable financing.


Some banks are consulting human rights groups when drafting policies and training manuals. Credit Suisse and ABN Amro both seek feedback from Amnesty International. HSBC works with the World Wildlife Fund on communicating the link between environmental and human rights risks to staff at the sharp end.


"The encouraging fact is that some banks are starting to realise the wide range of ways that human rights can impact their business, so they are developing some innovative ways of managing them," says Mike Kelly, head of corporate social responsibility at KPMG. "We are seeing new types of partnerships being formed that wouldn't have been dreamt of five years ago."


He adds: "Financial institutions really need to understand and manage human rights issues if they are to protect shareholder value, comply with future legislation and develop competitive advantage."


By Alison Maitland October 28 2004 02:00

In its aggressive pursuit of fraud, the North Dakota workers' compensation bureau has increasingly turned to private investigators and subpoenaed bank records to detect cheaters. But a consultants' report concludes the bureau has little to show for skyrocketing investigation costs that doubled over the past three years, topping $1 million last year, according to figures obtained by The Forum.


The report, by Octagon Risk Services, estimates the average successful fraud case against an injured worker cost almost $37,000 last year. That compares to an average claim of $40,000 paid out to a disabled worker to replace lost wages.


"We were unable to justify the increased costs," the consultants said, noting the bureau's investigative caseload remained stable while costs soared. The Octagon report provides the most thorough independent evaluation of the bureau's fraud unit since it was established a decade ago.


Released Sept. 22, the report has triggered a major overhaul in the fraud unit, which includes three staff investigators and a paralegal in addition to the private investigators hired at an hourly rate.


Sandy Blunt, the executive director of Workforce Safety and Insurance, the state workers' compensation bureau, removed the manager of the fraud unit last month. He also has hired the Octagon consultant who made the critical assessments about the fraud unit's effectiveness.


Dave Aberle, who had managed the bureau's fraud investigations unit almost since its inception, was reassigned and his salary was reduced from $70,890 to $60,264, effective Nov. 1


Blunt, who previously held an executive position in the Ohio workers' compensation program, took over the bureau in May.The 131-page Octagon report, which also reviewed the bureau's legal department, claims department and ombudsman program for injured workers, cost about $150,000.


By law, the bureau must commission a performance evaluation every two years.


The consultants concluded that private detectives often were called upon to investigate workers' claim cases that "likely do not involve fraud." In almost a quarter of last year's fraud cases, the bureau subpoenaed workers' bank records. Those administrative subpoenas were issued by staff lawyers, not judges, with no notice provided to the suspected worker. The consulting firm sharply criticized the value of private investigators' surveillance tapes and reports, which it found "generally lacking." In addition, the report noted the insertion of private investigators in claims lacking grounds to suspect fraud. "In evaluating the referral process, it is clear the Claims Department is making referrals to the Special Investigations Unit that likely do not involve fraud," the Octagon report said. Private investigators, who are paid $45 an hour, often were called upon to help claims analysts verify a worker's physical capabilities to determine eligibility for disability benefits, Blunt said.


During the course of an fraud investigation, private detectives sometimes interview injured workers' neighbors. They routinely conduct secret surveillance, videotaping their subjects from a discrete distance, sometimes using a long lens to peer inside windows. At times, investigators pose as someone else to elicit incriminating statements from workers suspected of fraud. Workers' lawyers have argued this practice is an invasion of privacy. But bureau officials say posing undercover is a common method of investigating insurance fraud.


Blunt said the bureau's use of investigators was due, in part, to proximity: Because the claims analysts are located at WSI's headquarters in Bismarck, it became normal procedure to use local private detectives to observe or question workers elsewhere in the state.


In the future, Blunt said, private investigators will no longer be called upon to help claims analysts in routine claims management tasks. Private investigators will only be used when the bureau has good cause to suspect fraud, he said.


The Octagon report also found that the bureau's focus on fraud is targeted overwhelmingly at workers, with less scrutiny given to employers or medical providers.
Last year, for example, 89 percent of the fraud unit's caseload involved injured worker fraud; the remaining 11 percent involved employer fraud.


But the results of that lopsided ratio are questionable, according to Octagon's cost-benefit analysis for investigations.


During 2003, 24 of 317 injured worker fraud cases resulted in actions to discontinue benefits, including two criminal prosecutions.


That translates into a "success" rate of 8 percent, at an average cost per "successful" investigation of $36,922. The true average cost for an investigation actually is probably less, since investigators were involved in non-fraud claims cases, but still is too high, consultants said.


By contrast, the bureau had seven fraud actions against employers in 2003, including five criminal prosecutions, or a "success" rate of 18 percent. That yielded an average cost per "successful" investigation of $4,980, according to Octagon's analysis.


The bureau's fraud unit had long claimed high returns for its investigations.


Over the 10-year history of the program, it claimed it saved $26.5 million, a sum based on actuarial estimates of future benefits for disabled workers. The bureau calculated the net savings from its fraud program was more than $21 million.


Those estimates now are under review.


"There's no way to beat around the bush - that was a high number," said consultant Jim Wesson, an insurance fraud specialist who wrote the section of the Octagon report evaluating the bureau's investigations and later was hired to revamp the program.


Any new estimate will be "soft," or subject to some speculation, but will become "harder," or more accurate, over time.


Investigation staff will no longer have a hand in estimating savings from fraud investigations, Blunt said.


"We want a number that is staunchly conservative and staunchly defendable," he said.


Criminal prosecution is relatively rare. According to the bureau, the fraud unit's investigations have resulted in 49 criminal fraud convictions, involving both workers and employers, since the first prosecution in 1995.


Figures show that workers are five times more likely to lose their benefits for suspicion of fraud than to be prosecuted and convicted.


Over the past three years, 85 workers received notice their benefits would stop because of suspected fraud, a decision reversed in two cases, bureau spokesman Mark Armstrong said.


Questionable value


Fees collected by private investigators can add up to five or six figures for firms handling multiple cases. In 2003, the bureau paid Rollie Port Investigations of Minot, N.D., $320,622, or almost 30 percent of its $1.1 million total outside investigation costs.


Typically, private investigators would be allowed about 15 hours of surveillance to determine an injured worker's activity level, the Octagon report said.


Often, staff investigators had to spend too much time reviewing private detectives' work.


"If the Special Investigations Unit investigators are required to watch the videotapes and document their own observations, then we are not sure what the private investigators are being paid for other than holding a camera," the Octagon report said.


Investigations usually originate with tips called in to the bureau's hotline or by referrals from the claims analysts who handle injured workers' cases.


"A great number of the referrals are made on claims that have aged and the claims analyst is looking for mitigating factors," the report said.


Defending probes


Lawyers who represent injured workers argue the bureau has aggressively used fraud investigations as a tool to find reasons to cut off workers' disability benefits.


They also maintain inappropriate case referrals subject workers to needless intrusion, including surveillance and administrative subpoenas issued without a judge's order.


"They're going after people because they filed their forms wrong," said Steven Latham, a Bismarck lawyer who represents injured workers.


Disabled workers must disclose work activities and income in monthly status reports they send to the bureau.


Armstrong, the bureau spokesman, denies that workers' comp uses fraud investigations, including the use of surveillance and subpoenas, indiscriminately.


"This is not a willy-nilly organization," he said. "We abide by and enforce the law. The truth is the truth."


Subpoenas, issued by an assistant attorney general who works for the bureau, aren't sought unless investigators have an "articulable suspicion," said Aberle, the former fraud unit chief.


"I don't want you to think I wield some arbitrary power," Aberle told The Forum in an interview last summer before his reassignment.


If the bureau has issued a subpoena, he said, it means investigators have collected evidence "and that evidence has been blessed by an assistant attorney general."


That standard of evidence is lower than the "probable cause" required for a subpoena in a criminal investigation.


But evidence obtained from the bureau's subpoenas and surveillance sometimes supports criminal prosecutions, said Bruce Schoenwald, a Fargo-Moorhead lawyer.


Schoenwald, the unsuccessful Democratic candidate for North Dakota attorney general in the Nov. 2 election, said the bureau's lawyers need more stringent oversight.


Similarly, private investigators aren't held to the same professional standards as licensed law enforcement officers, and are exempt from the anti-stalking law, he said.


The bureau's assistant attorneys general do not report to the attorney general. "There's no accountability for them, that's the problem," Schoenwald said.


Subpoena use rising


Attorney General Wayne Stenehjem said the workers' comp bureau is not the only state agency with assistant attorneys general who are under his limited control. He can remove them only if they are found incompetent or unethical.


Other examples, all exceptions to the general rule that he ultimately supervises state lawyers, include attorneys for the Tax Department, Insurance Department and Public Service Commission.


Also, assistant attorneys general in some other agencies can issue administrative subpoenas. Those in the office of the attorney general, for example, sometimes subpoena records in civil fraud and charitable gambling investigations, Stenehjem said.


To improve oversight, Stenehjem said the bureau should be brought back under the governor's authority. The 1997 Legislature removed the governor's control of the bureau and placed it under an appointed board of directors.


Blunt said he is accountable to his board and ultimately the public. The revamped fraud unit will focus more on serious fraud than mere abuse, he said.


Both can involve misrepresentation, but abuse of benefits is more minor, such as submitting a workers' comp claim for a non-work related injury.


In recent years, the bureau has become more aggressive in its use of subpoenas. The bureau's lawyers subpoenaed bank records of 77 workers in 2003 while investigating 317 cases of suspected fraud by workers collecting disability benefits, up from 21 in 2001.


Wesson, the new fraud consultant, said he didn't consider the bureau's use of subpoenas "inordinately high." However, he is drafting written guidelines for subpoena use.


Fraud studies lacking


One huge unknown still confronts the workers' comp fraud program: the incidence of fraud, nationally and in North Dakota.


When the fraud program was launched in 1994, workers' comp officials cited national estimates that as many as 20 percent to 25 percent of all claims were fraudulent.


Those estimates now are regarded by many as too high. No studies have been done, in North Dakota or nationwide.


The Coalition Against Insurance Fraud, a national advocacy group dominated by the insurance industry but also including regulators and legislators, is considering a study. Dennis Jay, the coalition's executive director, believes between 3 percent and 10 percent of workers' comp claims are fraudulent.


Although fraud estimates range from 10 percent to 25 percent nationally, Wesson regards 15 percent as a realistic estimate nationally. North Dakota's fraud rate is probably low, perhaps less than 10 percent, he said.


Regardless of which estimate is accurate, nobody disputes that fraud is a real problem that hurts honest workers and employers.


"It's a lot of money being lost out there," Jay said. "We don't have any money to lose here, so we have be smart."

by Patrick Springer (701) 241-5522 The Forum - 11/28/2004

The tenet that voice over IP saves money for enterprises seems to be true, but the amount of money that companies spend to deploy VoIP varies "wildly" by the vendor and the size of the company, says a new "benchmark" study by Nemertes Research.
For the study, titled "Convergence: Reality at Last," Nemertes interviewed IT executives from more than 100 enterprises about the costs and quality of their VoIP deployments. Nemertes terms these benchmark studies because they endeavor to determine costs and benefits as a new technology is deployed.


According to the study, initial deployment costs ranged from $515 to $1,512 per user. ShoreTel and Nortel Networks Inc. posted the lowest per-unit startup costs; Avaya and Cisco Systems Inc. posted the highest. "The low end [of] that would be companies with 1,000 users of more. With more users you get lower startup costs," says Robin Gareiss, principal research officer for Nemertes. Shoretel was at the low end with the lowest per unit cost for those with 100 or more users. Nortel had the lowest cost when there were 100 users or less, Gareiss says. Avaya had the highest cost for enterprises with 1,000 users or less.


Overall, says Gareiss, VoIP gets much higher marks for quality than it did 18 months ago when Nemertes did an initial study. "People are now convinced that the technology has reached the point where it is mature enough," says Gareiss.


Now the issues are ongoing savings and what many people see as the next step in VoIP, innovative and custom applications. "They have to be convinced of the business benefits and the application benefits," she says. "They need to see hard- dollar savings and how to leverage the network with applications that make the most use of it."


For overall quality, Shoretel ranked first in every area examined except "overall solution experience," where it tied with Nortel. "Shoretel customers just love the product," says Gareiss. They characterize it as "easy to use, straightforward, and like the simplicity."


Nortel greatly improved customer service ratings, which had been lower in earlier studies. They company has trimmed its reseller corps, which used to be voluminous. Previously Nortel was "slammed in customer service because the VARs were not trained," says Gareiss.


Cost savings remain the major driver for migration to VoIP, with long-distance, and moves, adds and changes being the areas of the biggest savings. And, deployments in new offices can save 20 percent to 40 percent on wiring alone, Gareiss found. Still, some companies migrate to VoIP "just to future-proof the network."

By default, all pre-installed blogs are displayed using a skin. (More on skins in another post.)

That means, blogs are accessed through 'index.php', which loads default parameters from the database and then passes on the display job to a skin.

Alternatively, if you don't want to use the default DB parameters and want to, say, force a skin, a category or a specific linkblog, you can create a stub file like the provided 'a_stub.php' and call your blog through this stub instead of index.php .

Finally, if you need to do some very specific customizations to your blog, you may use plain templates instead of skins. In this case, call your blog through a full template, like the provided 'a_noskin.php'.

You will find more information in the stub/template files themselves. Open them in a text editor and read the comments in there.

Either way, make sure you go to the blogs admin and set the correct access method for your blog. When using a stub or a template, you must also set its filename in the 'Stub name' field. Otherwise, the permalinks will not function properly.

Speech by Kari Hale, Director, Finance, Risk & Strategy Division


The U.K.’s Financial Services Authority (FSA) has set forth 22 investment priorities it intends to tackle next year. In a speech before risk-compliance executives, Kari Hale, director of the FSA’s Finance, Risk & Strategy Division, said the priorities include strengthening insurance and reinsurance regulation, the listing review, action on mis-selling and depolarization. Hale said the FSA does not expect to introduce “a raft of new policy measures,” but rather, expects to see the further development in and the implementation of its mortgage and general insurance regime and the launch of a “lighter regime for some products.” To stress this point, Hale notes that FSA chief executive John Tiner at the FSA’s annual public meeting in July said the authority is “absolutely determined that we will exercise our discretion to make new rules only where this can be justified by a robust market failure and cost benefit analysis.”

Speech by Kari Hale, Director, Finance, Risk & Strategy Division


The U.K.’s Financial Services Authority (FSA) has set forth 22 investment priorities it intends to tackle next year. In a speech before risk-compliance executives, Kari Hale, director of the FSA’s Finance, Risk & Strategy Division, said the priorities include strengthening insurance and reinsurance regulation, the listing review, action on mis-selling and depolarization. Hale said the FSA does not expect to introduce “a raft of new policy measures,” but rather, expects to see the further development in and the implementation of its mortgage and general insurance regime and the launch of a “lighter regime for some products.” To stress this point, Hale notes that FSA chief executive John Tiner at the FSA’s annual public meeting in July said the authority is “absolutely determined that we will exercise our discretion to make new rules only where this can be justified by a robust market failure and cost benefit analysis.”

Speech by Kari Hale, Director, Finance, Risk & Strategy Division


The U.K.’s Financial Services Authority (FSA) has set forth 22 investment priorities it intends to tackle next year. In a speech before risk-compliance executives, Kari Hale, director of the FSA’s Finance, Risk & Strategy Division, said the priorities include strengthening insurance and reinsurance regulation, the listing review, action on mis-selling and depolarization. Hale said the FSA does not expect to introduce “a raft of new policy measures,” but rather, expects to see the further development in and the implementation of its mortgage and general insurance regime and the launch of a “lighter regime for some products.” To stress this point, Hale notes that FSA chief executive John Tiner at the FSA’s annual public meeting in July said the authority is “absolutely determined that we will exercise our discretion to make new rules only where this can be justified by a robust market failure and cost benefit analysis.”

The effectiveness of antiretroviral therapy for HIV infection depends on how well patients adhere to complicated drug regimens. A team of researchers led by Sue Goldie of the Harvard Center for Risk Analysis at the Harvard School of Public Health, has developed a computer model to predict whether interventions ranging from inexpensive beepers and electronic reminders to expensive, clinic-based supervised therapy would improve adherence to AIDS drug regimens and prolong life at a reasonable cost by reducing treatment failures.


The researchers found that among patients with lower levels of adherence to their medication regimen, even very expensive, moderately effective adherence interventions are likely to offer cost-effective benefits that compare favorably with other interventions in HIV disease. The study appears in the current edition of the American Journal of Medicine.


The study modeled three types of HIV-infected patients: early-stage-disease patients enrolled in clinical trials, late-stage patients also enrolled in trials, and an urban group with intermediate-stage disease not enrolled in clinical trials. The model considered a variety of treatment regimens and outcomes, several strategies to improve adherence (including direct patient supervision in a clinical or home setting, electronic beepers, alarms, or pagers, and automated medicine dispensers), and additional data from public sources to estimate costs per QALY (Quality Adjusted Life Year) as projected treatment failures were reduced.


Writing in the article, Dr. Goldie states, “Our objective was to explore the associations among the effectiveness of interventions to improve adherence, the monthly cost of such interventions, and the long-term implications of improvements in measurable intermediate outcomes such as HIV RNA suppression.”


Dr. Goldie continues, “There is no consensus that defines the cost per QALY that represents acceptable value for money. However, cost-effectiveness ratios are often placed in context by comparisons with common health interventions, such as screening for colorectal cancer, hemodialysis, and cholesterol-lowering drugs for men with cardiovascular risk factors. Interventions costing less than a commonly suggested threshold of $50,000 per QALY are often considered reasonable value for money.”


Using this threshold, the researchers found that for patients with early-stage disease, interventions of $500 per month were cost-effective, while for intermediate and even late-stage patients, even more costly ($1000 per month) interventions could still result in favorable cost-effectiveness ratios.


The research team included Milton C. Weinstein, Ph.D., Kenneth A. Freedberg, MD, MSc., of the Harvard School of Public Health, along with members from the Yale University School of Medicine, Boston University School of Public Health, the Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham and Women’s Hospital.


For further information contact: David Ropeik Harvard Center for Risk Analysis 617.432.6011 dropeik@hsph.harvard.edu

The effectiveness of antiretroviral therapy for HIV infection depends on how well patients adhere to complicated drug regimens. A team of researchers led by Sue Goldie of the Harvard Center for Risk Analysis at the Harvard School of Public Health, has developed a computer model to predict whether interventions ranging from inexpensive beepers and electronic reminders to expensive, clinic-based supervised therapy would improve adherence to AIDS drug regimens and prolong life at a reasonable cost by reducing treatment failures.


The researchers found that among patients with lower levels of adherence to their medication regimen, even very expensive, moderately effective adherence interventions are likely to offer cost-effective benefits that compare favorably with other interventions in HIV disease. The study appears in the current edition of the American Journal of Medicine.


The study modeled three types of HIV-infected patients: early-stage-disease patients enrolled in clinical trials, late-stage patients also enrolled in trials, and an urban group with intermediate-stage disease not enrolled in clinical trials. The model considered a variety of treatment regimens and outcomes, several strategies to improve adherence (including direct patient supervision in a clinical or home setting, electronic beepers, alarms, or pagers, and automated medicine dispensers), and additional data from public sources to estimate costs per QALY (Quality Adjusted Life Year) as projected treatment failures were reduced.


Writing in the article, Dr. Goldie states, “Our objective was to explore the associations among the effectiveness of interventions to improve adherence, the monthly cost of such interventions, and the long-term implications of improvements in measurable intermediate outcomes such as HIV RNA suppression.”


Dr. Goldie continues, “There is no consensus that defines the cost per QALY that represents acceptable value for money. However, cost-effectiveness ratios are often placed in context by comparisons with common health interventions, such as screening for colorectal cancer, hemodialysis, and cholesterol-lowering drugs for men with cardiovascular risk factors. Interventions costing less than a commonly suggested threshold of $50,000 per QALY are often considered reasonable value for money.”


Using this threshold, the researchers found that for patients with early-stage disease, interventions of $500 per month were cost-effective, while for intermediate and even late-stage patients, even more costly ($1000 per month) interventions could still result in favorable cost-effectiveness ratios.


The research team included Milton C. Weinstein, Ph.D., Kenneth A. Freedberg, MD, MSc., of the Harvard School of Public Health, along with members from the Yale University School of Medicine, Boston University School of Public Health, the Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham and Women’s Hospital.


For further information contact: David Ropeik Harvard Center for Risk Analysis 617.432.6011 dropeik@hsph.harvard.edu

Jerry Avorn is professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School as well as the author of "Powerful Medicines: The Benefits, Risks, and Costs of Prescription Drugs." In it, he explains how prescription medicine needs to be evaluated on three levels: the benefits it offers patients, the side effects experienced by these patients, and the economic impact of the medicine. The author writes that this is important because he believes that it is those factors which keep the United States from developing and enacting a more cost-effective and universal system of healthcare.

CSPAN Book TV Public Lives www.booktv.org/publiclives

More than a year after the Custom Electronic Design & Installation Association decided to move its annual trade show out of tight quarters in Indianapolis, it's planning a comeback.

The massive CEDIA Expo will return to roomier digs in 2010 if city leaders succeed in adding 275,000 square feet to the convention center, razing the RCA dome to nearly double exhibit space. Association leaders were set to sign a multiyear commitment to Indianapolis midmonth, pledging to stay put through 2013.

The Indianapolis-based organization is moving its expo to Denver for three years beginning in 2006 and will spend a year in Atlanta before coming home. But officials can reconsider if the project isn't on track in 2008.

The CEDIA show is one of the city's largest annual events, attracting 24,000 attendees who spend $22 million. It was the first major event to announce plans to leave because of the space crunch, and the second to say it will return.

Last month, Laguna Beach, Calif.-based Performance Racing Industry agreed to return for four years beginning in December 2010 as long as the convention center is expanded. Luring PRI back means recapturing the $26 million its 40,000 attendees spend in the Circle City each year.

Together, the two trade shows could generate nearly $200 million in visitor spending during their four-year commitments. And the new business that is expected to flock to a larger center could spur another $165 million each year, according to estimates included in a 2004 feasibility study.

That's all ammunition CIB can use to rally support for the project, which includes a replacement for the RCA Dome.

With costs expected to exceed $700 million, some of the funding likely will come from higher hospitality taxes. That would require legislative approval, and CIB may seek other public support, too.

Before rate increases, a larger convention center would produce $8.6 million in newstate tax revenue each year, the feasibility study said. Glass told CIB members Nov. 8 that any request would be less than that.

As the need became more obvious, so did the site of the expansion.

After months of study, CIB settled on two possibilities: the RCA Dome parcel and property to the northwest now occupied by a state parking garage and, across West Street, a T.G.I. Friday's restaurant.

Glass said the northwest option has lost appeal. Among the biggest hurdles: the price. Expanding on the site of the dome is expected to cost $250 million; Plan B was more than twice that.

"With that kind of difference, I'm not sure the numbers work," Glass said.

Tearing down the dome would mean finding another home for the events held there now, but a new venue may have been in the cards anyway given the city's talks with the Indianapolis Colts and the NCAA's dissatisfaction with the 21-year-old facility as a site for its Final Four.

Still, the case for support of a $450 million retractable-roof stadium--officially a "multi-use venue"--is still coming together.

Consulting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers is studying the Colts' impact on the city and state, comparing the status quo to a scenario that includes a new venue. Results are expected later this month.

Glass expects to see numbers "well north" of the $72 million different consultants estimated in 1996, due in part to the team's success.

A new venue can't hurt, he said, and may help the Colts--and the city.

Under terms of a 1998 contract, the Colts could leave Indianapolis after the 2006 season if the team's revenue has not matched the league median for two of the past three years. Unless the city makes up the eight-figure difference.

City and team leaders have been working on an agreement behind closed doors, but Glass told CIB members a new venue would boost revenue.

Twenty-three of the 31 NFL cities have built or substantially remodeled their stadiums since the dome was erected in 1983, Glass said, which is raising the bar.

"That median revenue just keeps going up," he said.

Then there's the potential--if not likelihood--of an Indianapolis Super Bowl that would follow a stadium project, a one-time boost of $150 million or more.

And let's not let football overshadow basketball. This is Indiana, after all.

Indianapolis-based NCAA has agreed to stay put for the long haul and keep its hometown in a regular rotation for college basketball tournaments, as long as the dome is replaced or improved. Having the NCAA here has an economic impact of $65 million a year, Glass said, not counting the $30 million fans attending the Final Four spend.

By Andrea Muirragui Davis Volume 26, Number 36, November 15-21, 2004
Indianapolis Business Journal

An enduring issue in the development and use of conjoint analysis is consumer response to missing attributes in partial profiles. Academic research has failed to produce a consistent answer to this issue, and practitioners are more likely to view it as a nuisance factor. Bradlow, Hu, and Ho (2004) argue that inference making is common, follows a specified process, and when properly incorporated into the analysis, can enhance the predictive validity of the technique. The authors applaud the attempt to raise consciousness about the behavioral underpinnings of conjoint analysis, and they are intrigued by the specific model that Bradlow, Hu, and Ho advance. At the same time, however, the likelihood and substance of inference making is likely to vary as a function of the respondent's understanding of the task, the costs and benefits of engaging different imputation rules, prior beliefs about attribute relationships, and the way the beliefs are modeled. From a pragmatic perspective, the tractability and accuracy of proposed model will vary with its ability to represent attributes across a range of realistic levels. Nonetheless, progress toward a solution to the motivating problem requires formal attempts to address it. Bradlow, Hu and Ho offer a model that may stimulate additional research with respect to its assumptions and relative value compared with that of other, yet-to-be proposed alternatives. The authors identify additional behavioral topics that may enhance the psychological plausibility of conjoint analysis.

by Joseph W Alba and Alan D J Cooke
Journal of Marketing Research; November, 2004; Volume 41, Issue 4; page 382
http://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?did=748451441&sid=1&Fmt=2&clientId=13371&RQT=309&VName=PQD

Journal of Marketing Research

Pleometrosis, or colony founding via multiple queens, occurs in a localized population of the seed-harvester ant Pogonomyrmex californicus. In an apparently unusual secondary modification, queens of P. californicus are also obligate foragers; that is, queens must forage to garner the resources necessary to rear their first brood. Laboratory experiments measured the costs and benefits of pleometrosis and queen foraging in P. californicus in terms of queen survival, mass loss by queens and brood production. In all experiments, queen survival was positively associated with number of queens. Queen survival also varied with food level: survival was higher in fed treatments compared with unfed treatments at low queen numbers, whereas survival of unfed queens increased to the level of fed queens at higher queen numbers. Total mass loss of queens varied by food level, but not queen number, with fed queens losing about 50% less mass than unfed queens. Brood production also varied with queen number and food level. Total number of brood was positively associated with number of queens; at each queen number, fed queens produced more brood than unfed queens. The number of brood produced per queen, however, was similar across queen numbers. Fed queens also produced workers that were heavier than those produced by unfed queens, whereas head width of these minims was similar. Longer-term experiments revealed that these queen associations do not undergo queen reduction upon emergence of the first workers, but rather exhibit primary polygyny.

by Robert A Johnson. Animal Behaviour. November 2004. Volume 68 Part 5. page 1189
http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/622782/description#description
http://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?did=784775991&sid=1&Fmt=2&clientId=13371&RQT=309&VName=PQD