Blast Report Essay Example for Free

Blast Report Essay Blast Report The case study I received was about a family of four that was experiencing symptoms of fever, abdominal cramping, and diarrhea. The children were affected more severely than the adults. It seems that the family consumed spoiled food considering that their fridge broke early in the day and they ate the food that was in there later on. My blast came up with a 99. 6% match with Salmonella typhimurium. This seems to be an accurate match considering the symptoms related with a Salmonella typhimurium infection. Salmonella causes gastroenteritis with symptoms f diarrhea, vomiting, fever, and abdominal pain with elderly people, children and pregnant women being at greatest risk of developing infection. This is consistent with the familys children having more severe symptoms. Symptoms typically last two to five days. S. typhimurium causes infection by invading the intestinal mucosa and multiplying in specialized vacuoles and then invading the liver and spleen where it causes systematic disease. S. typhimurium enters the host orally through spoiled or undercooked meat and the incubation period is about 12 to 24 hours. It can also be transmitted through the fecal matter or contaminated water which can easily happen in poorly developed countries with poor waste management. Infection of S. typhimurium is highest in countries with poor sanitation but it can occur in any part of the world. The infection should clear up on its own for healthy individuals with access to clean water and food but if the infection spreads to the bloodstream, antibiotics will need to be taken. Transmission can be easily prevented by properly handling and cooking food, and by washing hands often. Since this family is therwise healthy and has access to clean food and water, they should be fine within a few days with no need for antibiotics. S. typhimurium is a rod shaped gram-negative bacterium. It is a facultative anaerobe so it does not require oxygen to survive. It is also motile via use of flagella. Unlike most Salmonella species, S. typhimurium does not ferment lactose. The citation I selected discusses the effect of the addition of nisin to current Salmonella antibiotics. Overuse and abuse of antibiotics has lead to a serious ongoing problem of antibiotic resistance.

Outsourcing Development Work to India Essay -- Globalization Jobs Work

Outsourcing Development Work to India I. Introduction Globalization has had a major impact on the way business is conducted. Companies are increasingly turning to offshore software development outlets for design management. Anywhere from one-half to two-thirds of all Fortune 500 companies are already outsourcing to India and the amount of work done there for U.S. companies is expected to more than double this year according to Forrester Research. This paper will take a look at some of the arguments for and against outsourcing IT development to India. Most importantly this paper will take a look at ethical standpoints taken on outsourcing. But first, we'll take a look at the history of outsourcing to India. II. History In the late 1980's the rise of India outsourcing had its start. During this phase, India provided skilled contract workers for the US. Efforts to outsource projects to India arose in the late 1990's. This was driven by a combination of rapidly changing technologies and shrinking IT budgets Little by little the small offshore development projects started to multiply. In the beginning it was trial and error because there wasn't much focus on a repeatable and process driven model. During this time offshore outsourcing led to several failures. The big outsourcing force during the late 1990's came with Y2K. Work needed to get done quick and outsourcing to Indian companies was a solution to this. Indian companies had the ability to scale rapidly. Y2K conversion wasn't too high in the value-chain job, however it gave Indian companies a view of what was possible. Then came process maturity and standardization through processes. Indian companies have spent much time honing rigorous developmen... ... http://news.com.com/2100-1011-5175699.html [4] Gupta, Sachin. For a global software company, outsourcing began at inception . World Paper. April 19. 2004 http://www.worldpaper.com/2004/april/april4.html [5] India greets H-1B cutback with a shrug -- But cap could sting if U.S. market rebounds. Electronic Engineering Times: 1, October 13, 2003. [6] Kripalani, Majeet & Egnardio, Pete. The Rise Of India. Business Week Online. December 8, 2003. http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/03_49/b3861001_mz001.htm [7] Outsourcing created more jobs in US. MSN Business. IANS. http://autofeed.msn.co.in/pandoraV2/output/33601A5C-9FA2-491F-8E3B-EBC7CC04EDAF.asp [8] Pink, Daniel. Wired Magazine. The New Face of the Silicon Age. How India became the capital of the computing revolution. February 4, 2004. http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/12.02/india.html

Family and Childcare Issues for Single Head of Households Essay

Child care issues greatly affect families in the low-income bracket. This means families earning less than 200% of poverty. Parents in this category usually find themselves less able to lead productive lives in relation to retaining employment. Disruptions in work schedules, including but not limited to absenteeism occur when parents are unable to provide adequate child care or are unable to access child care programs. With the rising cost of living, providing child care remains an uphill task for the low income families. Government interventions in providing affordable child care programs provide a relief for the working families in the low-income bracket. This enables the families secure their current jobs since high absenteeism and work related interruptions usually leads to loss of jobs and consequently loss of income and a resultant entrapment in poverty. Relationship between Child Care Assistance and Employment Cost of child care to low-income families The greatly affected parent in child care issues is the mother. In event that the mother in the low-income bracket happens to be the head of the household the issues become more compounded. However when the low-income mother gets access to child care support programs she is the more likely to get employed, retain employment, be self-reliant and consequently lead a better quality life. There is increased incidence of working single low-income mothers in recent years. With over 60 % of poverty stricken families with children working, the need for affordable child care programs is a necessity. Approximately 64% of the single, low-income mothers with children under six year are employed (Matthews, 2006. p.1). In the low-income bracket families spend 25% to 50% of their income on child care. Child care cost is not static but varies with the quality, type and certainly the particular country. In the U.S child care for a four year old child is in the range between $3,016 to $9,628 while that of an infant ranges from $3,803 to $13,480 in a year. This is above the affordability of the low-income single mother. In particular communities in the U.S the low-income families without access to child care programs can barely afford over 10% of the subsidized child care provided in their community (Matthews, 2006. p.2). In some counties the cost of child care visa vie the annual income of a single parent household is 56% (Contra Costa Child Care Council, 2003. p.1). The impact of the lack of reliable child care on employers cannot be neglected. Work related interruptions such as employee absenteeism have a direct negative impact on the organizations that employ the affected single parents. In 1998 these interruptions cost the U.S employers about $3 billion in lost revenue. Employee absenteeism as a result of child care issues results to an average of two days of work lost per year. Whereas about 65% of employees report late or leave early resulting to lost man-hours as a result of child care issues. In some states 20% of parents have had problems retaining employment, or securing employment as a result of child care problems, while about 37% have lost man-hours due to the same problem (Matthews, 2006. p.2). It is evident that a vast majority of the low-income families are engaged in jobs that do not offer paid leave or flexible work hours. This compounds the problem when the single parent has to lose their pay to attend to child care issues. This means that the costs, financial and otherwise, of child care are an impediment to women empowerment bearing in mind that they are the most likely to be directly affected by loss of income due to child care issues (Matthews, 2006. p.2). Child Care and Women Employment Provision of child care enables the single parent to get employment or retain current employment. If single heads of households received full support for child care, it would increase by 15% the proportion of working women and by 14% of the proportion of working low-income women earning approximately 185% of the poverty level. Access to child care support programs has a direct relationship to access to employment including employment retention to single heads of households. Single mothers with young children are 40% more likely to retain employment in the event that they get access to child care programs. The chance of employment in the low-income single mothers’ category increases by approximately 15% in the event that they receive child care support (Matthews, 2006. p.3). Need for Child Care More often that not, single heads of households need to work away from home thus creating the need for child care from outside the family set-up. In the view of this access to child care centers becomes a necessity. Child care centers fall into two basic categories namely the licensed and the non-licensed. Licensing child care centers ensures that minimum acceptable standards for child care are met and consequently maintained. However the child care provided from the child’s home exempt from the licensing requirements although it is deemed as legal. The unlicensed child care service providers operate in violation of the law (Oklahoma Child Care, 2005. p.6).   Ã‚  In states like Oklahoma for instance, 58.7% of children below thirteen years live in households headed by a single parent. In the view of this a huge number of these children (above 300,000) need child care on a daily basis. Due to the lack of adequate and affordable licensed child care facilities families rely on other service providers other than the licensed child care centers. These other service providers include family members, neighbors and the unlicensed child care centers. Single parents with infants are less fortunate since the available licensed child care centers are hesitant in admitting infants (Oklahoma Child Care, 2005. p.6-10). In Contra Costa County, children below five years of age living in households headed by a single parent account for 17% of the total number of children. However the available child care centers are overwhelmed by the numbers of children in need of these facilities. The licensed child care available can only cater for 32% of the total number of children with employed parents. That creates a deficit of 68% who may only access child care from the unlicensed child care centers and other service providers. Lack of adequate facilities to cater for the children with special needs aggravates the problem (Contra Costa Child Care Council, 2003. p.1). Effect of Child Care Support on Employment In general single parents who get access to child care facilities are more productive at their work places working for longer hours and hence increasing their earnings. However single parents who access the subsidized child care programs achieve over 100% increased earning with 50% increase in the total number of months engaged in productive work. It has been proved that access to subsidized child care programs is directly related to increased job retention among the beneficiary single parents. While there is 25% to 43% likelihood of decrease in job losses among the beneficiaries of the subsidized child care programs (Matthews, 2006. p.4).   It is evident that the cost of child care drains the income especially of the single parent in that it accounts for more than the proportion of the income that caters for rent, mortgages, and the cost of good quality college education (Oklahoma Child Care, 2005. p. 2).

What Was the USSR and Which Countries Were in It

The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (also known as the USSR or the  Soviet Union) consisted of Russia and 14  surrounding countries. The USSRs territory stretched from the Baltic states in Eastern  Europe to the Pacific Ocean, including the majority of northern Asia and portions of central Asia. The USSR in Brief The USSR was founded in 1922, five years after the Russian Revolution overthrew the monarchy of Czar Nicholas II. Vladimir Ilyich Lenin was one of the leaders of the revolution and was the first leader of the USSR until his death in 1924. The city of Petrograd was renamed Leningrad in his honor. During its existence, the USSR was the largest country by area in the world. It included more than 8.6 million square miles (22.4 million square kilometers) and stretched 6,800 miles (10,900 kilometers) from the Baltic Sea in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. The capital of the USSR was Moscow, which is also modern Russias capital city. The USSR was also the largest communist country. Its Cold War with the United States (1947–1991)  filled most of the 20th century with tension that extended throughout the world. During much of this time (1927–1953), Joseph Stalin was the totalitarian leader. His regime is known as one of the most brutal in world history; tens of millions of people lost their lives while Stalin held power. The decades after Stalin saw some reforms of his brutality, but Communist Party leaders became wealthy on the backs of the people. Bread lines were common in the 1970s as staples such as food and clothing were scarce. By the 1980s, a new type of leader emerged in Mikhail Gorbachev. In an attempt to boost his countrys sagging economy, Gorbachev introduced a pair of initiatives known as glasnost and perestroika. Glasnost called for political openness and ended the banning of books and the KGB, allowed citizens to criticize the government, and allowed for other parties than the Communist Party to participate in elections. Perestroika was an economic plan that combined communism and capitalism. Ultimately the plan was a failure, and the USSR was dissolved. Gorbachev resigned on December 25, 1991, and the Soviet Union ceased to exist six days later on December 31. Boris Yeltsin, a key leader of the opposition, later became the first president of the new Russian Federation. The CIS The Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) was a somewhat unsuccessful effort by Russia to keep the USSR together in an economic alliance. It was formed in 1991 and included many of the independent republics that made up the USSR. In the years since its formation, the CIS has lost a few members and other countries have never joined. By most accounts, analysts think of the CIS as little more than a political organization in which its members exchange ideas. Very few of the agreements that the CIS has adopted have, in reality, been implemented. Countries in the USSR Of the fifteen constituent republics of the USSR, three of these countries declared and were granted independence a few months preceding the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991. The remaining 12 did not become independent until the USSR fell completely on December 26, 1991. ArmeniaAzerbaijanBelarus  Estonia  (Granted independence in  September 1991 and is  not a member of the  CIS)Georgia  (Withdrew from the  CIS in May 2005)KazakhstanKyrgyzstanLatvia  (Granted independence in  September 1991 and is  not a member of the  CIS)Lithuania  (Granted independence in  September 1991 and is  not a member of the  CIS)Moldova (Formerly known as Moldavia)RussiaTajikistanTurkmenistan  (Associate member of the CIS)Ukraine (Participating member of the CIS)Uzbekistan Sources The Collapse of the Soviet Union. United States Department of State.The Fall of the Soviet Union. University of North Carolina.