scholarly journals The Efficiency of Subjective Well-being: a Key of Latin American Development

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pablo Beytía

This chapter compares the development of Latin American countries with that of traditionally developed nations, based on several international indicators of well-being and sustainability that have emerged in the last decade. It is argued that in Latin America there is a specific type of development, which could be understood as an alternative path to the traditional model of social progress. The key to understand this type of development would be "the efficiency of subjective well-being": people get high happiness and life satisfaction with lower economic, state and environmental costs than in traditionally developed countries. It is suggested that the cohesion and quality of family ties is a key factor to explain this particular form of development: in Latin America the family has a relevant role in social security and at the same time would be important to explain the outstanding levels of subjective well-being.

2017 ◽  
Vol 3 (4) ◽  
pp. 403-435 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jennifer E. Givens

Research on the carbon intensity of well-being (CIWB), a measure representing a country's development in terms of both environmental and human well-being, often explores the role of economic development, while the effects of other aspects of global integration remain under-explored. I use macro-comparative sociological perspectives to investigate the extent to which theories of global integration help explain variation in countries’ CIWB over time. I evaluate propositions drawn from neoinstitutional world society and world polity theories using longitudinal modeling techniques to analyze data from 81 countries from 1990 to 2011. I also examine subsets of more and less developed countries and compare production- and consumption-based measures of CIWB. I find that world society/world polity integration is associated with a reduction in CIWB only in more developed nations, and only when using the production measure for CO2 emissions, highlighting the complexities of sustainable development in an unequal global system.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gabriel de Albuquerque Vasconcelos ◽  
Rodrigo Montenegro Barreira ◽  
Karmelita Emanuelle Nogueira Torres Antoniollo ◽  
Alina Maria Nuñez Pinheiro ◽  
Cíntia Fernandes Rodrigues Maia ◽  
...  

Autoimmune encephalitis is an increasingly recognized cause of encephalitis. The majority of case series report patients residing in developed countries in the northern hemisphere. The epidemiologic features of autoimmune encephalitis in Latin America are still unclear. The aim of the study was to perform a review of the clinical presentation of autoimmune encephalitis in Latin America and compare to world literature. References were identified by an in-depth literature search and selected on the basis of relevance to the topic and authors' judgment. We selected clinical studies and case reports published from 2007 to July, 2020 including patients from Latin American countries. Of the 379 patients included, the majority were cases of anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis (93.14%), followed by anti-VGKC-complex encephalitis (N = 17; 4.48%), anti-GAD encephalitis (N = 9; 2.37%), anti-AMPA receptor encephalitis (N = 1; 0.26%), anti-GABA receptor encephalitis (N = 1; 0. 26%), anti-mGluR5 encephalitis (N = 1; 0. 26%), and anti-mGluR1 encephalitis (N = 1; 0. 26%). Reported cases of Anti-NMDA encephalitis in Latin-America had a very slight female predominance, lower prevalence of associated tumors and a lower incidence of extreme delta brush on electroencephalogram. Autoimmune encephalitis is possibly underdiagnosed in underdeveloped countries. Its outcome after treatment, however, appears to be similarly favorable in Latin American patients as has been reported in developed countries based on available case reports and case series. Regional specificities in the manifestation of autoimmune encephalitis could be related to epidemiologic factors, such as the presence of different triggers and different genetic and immunologic background, that need to be studied by future research.


Author(s):  
Pablo Bolaños-Villegas ◽  
Pablo Bolaños-Villegas ◽  
Pablo Bolaños-Villegas ◽  
Pablo Bolaños-Villegas ◽  
Pablo Bolaños-Villegas ◽  
...  

Latin America is home to more than 600 million people and has considerable natural and human resources. However, investment in science and technology (S&T) lags far behind that in developed countries. This gap represents a barrier to the development of economies based on knowledge and hampers the region's ability to tackle environmental and social problems. This lack of investment is evident in the extreme case of Venezuela, where much of the science workforce has fled economic chaos, but also in every Latin American country, including science powers such as Brazil and Argentina, where federal budgets in science, technology and education have been drastically reduced in recent years. Investments in S&T foster cooperation, commerce and good will and enhance resilience in the face of environmental and social turmoil. Therefore, scientists must start to actively engage governments and encourage long-term spending in S&T to support the development of Latin American societies.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rosangela Bando ◽  
Sebastián Galiani ◽  
Paul Gertler

Public expenditures on non-contributory pensions are equivalent to at least 1 percent of GDP in several countries in Latin America and is expected to increase. We explore the effect of non-contributory pensions on the well-being of the beneficiary population by studying the "Pensiones Alimentarias" program established by law in Paraguay, which targets older adults living in poverty. Households with a beneficiary increased their level of consumption by 44 percent. The program improved subjective well-being in 0.48 standard deviations. These effects are consistent with the findings of Bando, Galiani and Gertler (2020) and Galiani, Gertler and Bando (2016) in their studies on the non-contributory pension schemes in Peru and Mexico. Thus, we conclude that the effects of non-contributory pensions on well-being in Paraguay are comparable to those found for Peru and Mexico and add to the construction of external validity.


1998 ◽  
Vol 14 (suppl 3) ◽  
pp. S109-S115 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vera Luiza da Costa e Silva ◽  
Sergio Koifman

Smoking has become a major public health problem in Latin America, and its scope varies from country to country. Despite difficulties in obtaining methodologically consistent data for the region, we analyzed the results from prevalence surveys in 14 Latin American countries. Smoking prevalence among men varied from 24.1% (Paraguay) to 66.3% (Dominican Republic) and among women from 5.5% (Paraguay) to 26,6% (Uruguay). By applying point prevalence data to the stage model of the tobacco epidemic in developed countries, we concluded that the Latin American countries are in stage 2, i.e., with a clearly rising prevalence among men, a prevalence for women that is beginning to increase, and mortality attributable to smoking among men still not reflecting peak prevalence. None of the countries analyzed appeared to have reached stage 3, in which one observes a downward trend in prevalence of smoking among men and peak prevalence among women, with broad impact on tobacco-related mortality. The only exception appears to be Paraguay, which is still emerging from stage 1, i.e., with low prevalence rates among men, too. Nevertheless, high lung cancer mortality rates in Uruguay and Argentina are comparable to those of the developed countries.


2019 ◽  
Vol 6 (Supplement_2) ◽  
pp. S545-S545
Author(s):  
Holly Yu ◽  
Nestor Flaster ◽  
Adrian Casanello ◽  
Daniel Curcio

Abstract Background In contrast to Europe and North America, little is known about Clostridioides difficile infection (CDI) in Latin America, especially about risk factors, mortality, and healthcare utilization. Methods We conducted a retrospective, case–control study at eight hospital centers in Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, and Chile. Hospital databases and medical records were used to identify nosocomial CDI cases from January 1, 2014 to December 31, 2017. CDI cases were patients with diarrhea and a positive CDI testing ≥72 hours after hospital admission. Two controls with no CDI diagnosis and diarrhea were matched to each CDI case and were required to (1) have a length of hospital stay (LOS) ≥ 3 days, (2) be admitted ±14 days from the case, and (3) share the same ward. Risk factors associated with CDI were assessed by conditional logistic regression. Mortality and healthcare utilization were compared between cases and controls. Results A total of 1,443 patients (≥18 years old) who met eligibility criteria were selected (481 cases and 962 controls). Comparing cases to controls, the mean age and gender representation were similar (age: 58.7 vs. 56.7 years, P = 0.269; male: 56.3% vs. 53.4%, P = 0.293), but comorbidity was higher (mean Charlson Comorbidity index: 4.3 vs. 3.6, p Conclusion Antibiotic exposure, existing medical conditions, and recent hospital admission are CDI major risk factors in Latin America. CDI also increased in-hospital death risk and LOS. These findings are consistent with published literature in developed countries. Disclosures All authors: No reported disclosures.


2018 ◽  
pp. 1-8
Author(s):  
Diana Mendoza-Cervantes ◽  
Isabel Otero ◽  
Jo Anne Zujewski ◽  
Jorge Ferrandiz Salazar ◽  
Gabriela López Córdova ◽  
...  

Purpose Cancer mortality is approximately twice as high in Latin American countries than in more developed countries. In particular, the countries of the high Andean region of Latin America carry a double burden of breast and cervical cancers. In these countries, there are disproportionately higher mortality to incidence ratios compared with other regions in Latin America. The US National Cancer Institute’s Center for Global Health, the Pan American Health Organization, and the Ministry of Health in Peru collaborated to design and execute an education and advocacy workshop in Lima, Peru. The workshop was convened to discuss regional challenges and practices, as well as to support the implementation of Plan Esperanza, Peru’s national cancer control plan. Methods Workshop participants included local and international experts to present the state of the science, health practitioners, and advocacy groups to discuss unique barriers that women in the region experience. Results Inequalities in access to and distribution of medical expertise, lack of continuity of cancer control plans, and the need for sustained public buy-in emerged as obstacles. Conclusion The workshop provided a forum to discuss key issues regarding breast and cervical cancer control among health professionals and advocates in Peru and the region. This article outlines the resulting recommendations.


1968 ◽  
Vol 62 (3) ◽  
pp. 889-897 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martin C. Needler

One way of acquiring insight into the processes of political development in Latin America is to compare the countries of the area systematically in terms of the “degree of development” which each can be said to have attained. Ideally, such an enterprise can lead to the understanding of the past history of the “more developed” countries by reference to the present problems of the “less developed” while an understanding of the problems confronting the more developed countries can make possible a glimpse into the future of those now less developed. Isolation of the factors responsible for a state's being more or less developed can moreover prove instructive for the understanding of the relations between political and socioeconomic phenomena.Perhaps most important, such comparisons provide the means for holding constant effects attributable to characteristics shared by all, or nearly all, of the Latin American countries. Thus it can be argued with much plausibility that military intervention in politics, say, derives from elements in the Hispanic tradition. Yet it is clear that the frequency of military intervention varies from country to country, even where they share equally in that tradidition. Thus one is forced to go beyond the “Hispanic tradition” thesis with which the investigation might otherwise have come to rest.In the present article I will be concerned with the problem of the relation of political development to socioeconomic development in the Latin American context. For reasons that will become apparent below, I will not at this point attempt a rigorous analysis of the concept of political development, which has already been the subject of a large and rapidly growing literature.


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