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Economix Blog: America’s New Mothers Among the Youngest

July 1, 2013 by Leave a Comment

CATHERINE RAMPELL

CATHERINE RAMPELL

Dollars to doughnuts.

While digging through the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development’s annual education report last week, I came across this fascinating chart:

Source: Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. Source: Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

It shows that across the developed world, women have been waiting longer to have their first child. The average age of first childbirth was 24.3 in 1970 compared to 27.8 in 2009, the most recent year for which comparable international data are available. That’s not a huge surprise; as more women have entered the labor force, many have delayed child-rearing.

More striking, at least to me, is how young new mothers are in the United States versus the rest of the developed world. In the United States in 2009, the average age for a mother who just had her first child was 25; only Mexico had a lower age at first childbirth, 21.3.

On the other end of the spectrum are Germany and Britain, where average age at first childbirth was 30.

For more data on fertility around the world, the O.E.C.D. offers this compilation of statistics.

You can also find data on age at first childbirth by American state from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, though the most recent state-level data I’ve been able to find are from 2006. That year, new mothers in Mississippi were the youngest, averaging 22.6 years old at first childbirth, and those in Massachusetts were the oldest, averaging 27.7 years old.

Finally, for a look at the extraordinarily high (and growing) costs of childbirth in the United States, see this article by my colleague Elisabeth Rosenthal.

Article source: http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/07/01/americas-new-mothers-among-the-youngest/?partner=rss&emc=rss

Filed Under: Economy News Tagged With: , ,

Frequent Flier: Depending on the Kindness of Strangers, and Finding Them Generous

June 24, 2013 by Leave a Comment

The foundation works with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, but we’re an independent nonprofit organization created by Congress. We build partnerships and find resources to help the C.D.C. do its work faster and more flexibly. So most of my travel is bridge-building between donor programs and the C.D.C., or maybe I’ll fly out with an expert who will talk to people about chronic disease prevention or stopping the next pandemic.

Because I’ve been flying for so long, I remember when flying was glamorous. I would sit in this huge, comfortable seat in coach, and once the regional airline I flew held a wine-tasting on my trip from St. Louis to the District of Columbia. Now, like everyone else, I’m lucky if I get a cracker on a flight. But I enjoy flying and have never lost the appreciation of sliding up through dark clouds into sunshine.

Because I usually try to work on flights, I don’t talk to seatmates much. If someone starts a conversation, I’m polite. People are always curious about the C.D.C., and I always find it interesting when people start talking about movies like “Outbreak” or “Contagion” in which there is some C.D.C. connection. People loved “Outbreak,” but were more uncomfortable with “Contagion,” which is more realistic.

I travel to many countries, and I was just in Turkey. Through education and partnerships, including one with the C.D.C., fewer people in that country now use tobacco. I was there during the protests, which started to turn violent. I took a taxi back to the hotel after a ceremony I attended. We went down a lot of alleys to avoid the protesters, and I’m sure I saw parts of Istanbul few tourists have ever seen.

Given a chance, most people want to help someone, and it’s always reassuring to find just how good people can be, especially on a business trip.

Several weeks after Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast, I flew to Gulfport, Miss., to meet with emergency response officials from the State Health Department. I had reservations to fly to Baton Rouge, La., for similar meetings. The Mississippi meetings went well, but downed trees and detours made it difficult to get back to the airport. I missed my flight to Baton Rouge and was desperately searching for a one-way rental car so I could make the drive.

Neither of the first two rental companies was willing to release one of the few vehicles in their inventory for a one-way trip. The representative at the third and last option apologized, but said no one-way rentals were available, either. But as I turned to leave, another gentleman behind the counter, who was the manager, told me to have a seat, and a few minutes later came back to tell me that although he couldn’t release a one-way vehicle, he would assign one of his employees to drive me the 140 miles to Baton Rouge. That employee would then return with the car.

Despite the commitment of a car, fuel and six hours of his employee’s time, he refused to accept any payment. By 11 p.m., I arrived in Baton Rouge at the home of a friend of a friend, who earlier in the day said, “My wife and I will be asleep when you arrive. Just take the last bedroom at the end of the hall.” I had never met this couple before, and to be honest I was blown away by everyone’s generosity.

By Charlie Stokes, as told to Joan Raymond. E-mail: joan.raymond@nytimes.com.

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/25/business/depending-on-the-kindness-of-strangers.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Filed Under: Global Business Tagged With: , ,

Media Decoder: Center to Offer Tools for Gauging Impact of Media

April 29, 2013 by Leave a Comment

LOS ANGELES — What is the difference?

If your question is like that one, more practical than philosophical, the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism may soon have an answer.

With $3.25 million in initial financing from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, the college’s Norman Lear Center is about to create what it is calling a “global hub” for those who would measure the actual impact of media — journalistic, cinematic, social and otherwise.

“The metrics that have been used for this have been astonishingly primitive,” said Martin Kaplan on a phone call last week.

Mr. Kaplan, the director of the Lear Center, will join its director of research, Johanna Blakley, as a principal “investigator” for the new enterprise. He spoke last week about the futility of counting page-views, “likes,” and retweets when trying to figure out whether an opinion piece, a documentary film or a television show actually moved anyone.

“Those measure how many people saw something,” he said. “That’s not the same as an outcome.”

More than a decade ago, the Lear Center first engaged with measurement issues when it tried to track the impact of an episode of “The Bold and the Beautiful” about a character who was H.I.V. positive. The center monitored H.I.V.-related queries to the Centers for Disease Control immediately after the show. “We saw this huge spike in calls,” Mr. Kaplan said.

The new university program, he said, is meant to be a clearinghouse for information from researchers around the world, and an incubator for new ways to measure what matters.

The idea, he added, is to provide tools on an “open-source” basis, putting socially minded nonprofit groups on a more equal footing with corporate advertisers, who use sophisticated, but expensive, measurements.

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/29/business/media/center-to-offer-tools-for-gauging-impact-of-media.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

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Public-Private Effort Seeks to Expedite Discovery of Autism Drugs

April 25, 2013 by Leave a Comment

Under a contract with the institute, U.C.L.A. will form a network of researchers at other academic centers that will try to identify promising new and older drug compounds quickly, and conduct early tests to see if they merit additional investment.

The program, part of the “Fast Fail” initiative at the institute, aims to determine within weeks whether a drug works, rather than the years it traditionally takes to evaluate a new drug.

“The whole idea is just getting much better in these early phases at identifying drugs that are going to be efficacious and safe, and thereby greatly speeding the development of effective new therapies and reducing the overall cost,” said Dr. James McCracken, who is leading the effort at U.C.L.A. as director of the division of child and adolescent psychiatry at the Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior.

The number of diagnosed cases of autism, Asperger’s syndrome and related disorders in children has been growing in recent years, largely because of increased awareness. A recent report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Health Resources and Services Administration concluded that one in 50 children aged 6 to 17 had been found to have autism or a related disorder, a 72 percent increase since 2007.

Although more cases are being diagnosed, no drugs are approved to treat the core symptoms of the disorders, which are characterized by delays in developing effective communication and social skills. Other drugs often prescribed to people with the disorders treat difficult behaviors like aggressiveness, hyperactivity and irritability.

Dr. McCracken said developing effective treatments had been difficult because the underlying causes were poorly understood until the last few years, and some prominent efforts had failed. In 2004, the experimental drug secretin, developed by RepliGen, did not show that it worked in an advanced clinical trial, disappointing parents of children with autism who had placed their hopes in the drug.

Several major drug companies, including GlaxoSmithKline and AstraZeneca, have scaled back their research in the neurosciences because of the high failure rate, Dr. McCracken said.

Developing drugs to treat neurological disorders is difficult, in part because brain science is still evolving. The field is littered with drugs that scientists had hoped would be effective against diseases like Alzheimer’s and schizophrenia but that performed poorly in clinical trials.

Despite the setbacks, scientific advances in understanding the genetic underpinnings of autism have accelerated, leaving the door open for new drug discoveries, said Robert H. Ring, vice president of translational research at Autism Speaks, a patient advocacy group.

“Autism spectrum disorder is the brave new world of medicine development, and most companies out there — despite a lot of the retraction you’re seeing — they do recognize autism as a clear area of opportunity,” said Mr. Ring, who serves on a committee that helps select which compounds the U.C.L.A. program will test.

Some companies are pursuing treatments. Seaside Therapeutics, a private company in Cambridge, Mass., is developing drugs to treat autism and a form of mental retardation known as fragile X syndrome in a partnership with Roche.

“The approach that people have taken over the years is, ‘This person looks anxious, I’ll give them a drug I use to treat anxiety,’ ” said Dr. Randall L. Carpenter, a co-founder of Seaside and its chief executive. “We hope to treat the underlying molecular abnormality.”

Dr. McCracken said the program would identify four to eight compounds and run them through small trials in humans, testing how the drugs are absorbed and how they affect brain wave patterns that scientists say they believe are linked to autism.

“It’s taken a really long time to kind of crack open and begin to understand part of the disorder of brain biology that underpins autism,” Dr. McCracken said. “This is, to me, the most exciting time because we understand so much more than we did even five or 10 years ago.”

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/25/business/public-private-effort-seeks-to-expedite-discovery-of-autism-drugs.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Filed Under: Global Business Tagged With: , ,

Advertising: Using Google’s Data to Sell Thermometers to Mothers

December 23, 2011 by Leave a Comment

Google correlated billions of flu-related Web searches from 2003 to 2008 with actual Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data over the same period. Then, because Web searchers’ Internet addresses indicated location, Google devised a formula to estimate regional flu activity based solely on searches, with a reporting lag of only about a day, outdoing C.D.C. flu reports, which typically are published a week or two after outbreaks.

In 2009, researchers from Google and the C.D.C. wrote an article summarizing their findings in the journal Nature, and stated that the new predictive model — now called Google Flu Trends and accessible in an interactive format online — could be a boon to public health. “Up-to-date influenza estimates may enable public health officials and health professionals to better respond to seasonal epidemics,” they wrote.

What the researchers probably did not predict was that the Google flu data would end up being the cornerstone of an advertising campaign.

For the Vicks Behind Ear Thermometer, a new product that determines temperature when placed in the soft area behind the ear, marketers wanted to reach mothers, the primary purchasers of thermometers.

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A mobile campaign by Blue Chip Marketing Worldwide, which is based in Chicago, places the ads for the thermometer within popular apps like Pandora that collect basic details about users, including their sex and whether they are parents, and can pinpoint specific demographics to receive ads.

But not all mothers will see the ad on their smartphones. Rather, the ads will be sent only to devices that, according to Google, are in regions experiencing a high incidence of flu. Also, the ads will only be delivered to mothers within two miles of retailers that carry the thermometer, including Walmart, Target and Babies “R” Us.

“Flu levels in your area are high,” says the banner ad within an app. “Be prepared with Vicks revolutionary Behind Ear Thermometer.”

Tapping the ad, which also notes the nearest store that sells the thermometer (“Buy at Rite Aid .3 miles away.”), brings users to a product page with items including an informational video and a list of nearby retailers. Tapping a retailer reveals directions there.

Also handling the campaign, which was introduced in a limited way early in December and will be at full throttle when flu season peaks in January and February, is Where, the location-based mobile advertising network that is a division of PayPal, a unit of eBay.

“It understands how this mom lives and shops, and she receives the message in the most relevant manner,” said Stanton Kawer, chief executive of Blue Chip, about the campaign. “It is so fantastically targeted that it’s really amazing.”

The new thermometer is made by Kaz, which through licensing agreements markets thermometers under the Vicks and Braun brands (both owned by Procter Gamble), and which also makes Vicks humidifiers.

Sales for thermometers follow flu season, picking up in October, peaking in January and February, and tapering off in March and April, according to Lara Peterson, a vice president for marketing at Kaz, a subsidiary of Helen of Troy Limited.

Smartphones are used by 53 percent of Americans ages 18 to 24 and 64 percent of those 25 to 34, according to Nielsen. Google reports that 79 percent of owners use them for shopping purposes like comparing prices and locating a retailer.

Organizations including the American Academy of Pediatrics now recommend against mercury thermometers (citing the danger of both mercury and glass). Sales of digital thermometers are up, growing about 17 percent from 2005 to 2010, according to a report from Mintel, a market research firm.

The American Academy of Pediatrics still recommends taking temperature rectally for newborns under 3 months, and not taking it orally until children are at least 4 years old. The newest generation of digital thermometers measure parts of the body including the underarm, forehead and inside the ear.

The new Vicks thermometer, with a suggested retail price of $40 to $50, is the first in the category made specifically to measure behind the ear, according to Ms. Peterson, of Kaz.

“It measures fever in a very noninvasive way,” said Ms. Peterson, adding that the location’s proximity to the carotid artery, which carries blood to the brain, ensures accurate readings.

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Because feverish children can be particularly fidgety, the ease of use strikes a chord with parents. Kaz recently commissioned a study where the device was used to take the temperature of napping babies at a day care center, and 95 percent slept through it.

In addition to print and online advertising, also by Blue Chip, commercials for the thermometer will be shown in more than 2,600 pediatricians’ offices for two months beginning Jan. 15, through a deal with KidCare TV, which provides informational programming to waiting rooms.

As for the mobile campaign aimed at mothers in high-flu areas, Brian Morrissey, editor in chief of Digiday, an online publication that covers digital marketing and media, said being tracked by advertisers had a “creepy factor” for some consumers.

Many Facebook users, for example, balked when in 2007 it introduced Beacon, a program that shared their online purchases with their social network. “Creepiness comes in when consumers are surprised,” Mr. Morrissey said.

But he predicted consumers would actually like the thermometer campaign.

“It seems like they’ll pull it off, because they’re using the data in a smart way, for advertising that’s more relevant and useful,” Mr. Morrissey said.

Article source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=607345f41686efddd2ed22ae1174d33a

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Virulent E. Coli Strain Spreads in Germany and Puzzles Health Officials

June 2, 2011 by Leave a Comment

The source of the outbreak, which has killed at least 16 people — 15 in Germany and a Swede who visited there recently — remained unknown.

Public health officials are alarmed because a startlingly high proportion of those infected suffer from a potentially lethal complication attacking the kidneys, called hemolytic uremic syndrome, which can provoke comas, seizures and stroke. Dr. Robert Tauxe, deputy director of food-borne disease at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, said the rate of cases of acute kidney failure in the outbreak was unprecedented. “That makes this an extraordinarily large and severe event,” he said.

While most of the infections were among people who had traveled to northern Germany, the authorities acknowledged that the outbreak had spread to virtually every corner of the country.

Shoppers and vegetable sellers in Berlin expressed a blend of confusion, anger and stoicism; about 20 cases of E. coli infection have been reported in the capital city. “A lot of people are afraid or worried,” said Nursan Usta, 43, who runs a fruit and vegetable stall in Berlin’s blue-collar Neukölln district. “They aren’t even buying cherries” — even though the authorities have mentioned only cucumbers, lettuce and tomatoes as potential sources of infection. In Motril, a town in Spain’s agricultural heartland, greenhouses were empty of workers as demand for vegetables collapsed after the German authorities initially — and most likely mistakenly — pointed to Spain as a source of the outbreak.

“Working in a greenhouse can be tough, but I’ve never felt more exhausted and empty inside than now,” said Miguel Rodríguez Puentedura, who had been picking cucumbers until Monday, when the greenhouse that employed him shut down.

Health officials in Hamburg, the center of the outbreak, appealed Wednesday for donors to contribute blood.

Scientists are at a loss to explain why this little-known organism, identified as E. coli 0104:H4, has proved so virulent.

The European authorities have reported several differences from previous outbreaks, including that women make up more than two-thirds of those affected and that young and middle-aged adults account for a very high percentage of the most severe cases. Dr. J. Glenn Morris, director of the Emerging Pathogens Institute of the University of Florida, said that the German strain might have undergone genetic changes or mutations to make it more potent.

The high number of cases of acute kidney failure represents a much higher percentage of the total number of illnesses than in previous outbreaks associated with different strains of E. coli. Generally, 5 to 10 percent of E. coli illnesses result in this complication. Among the confirmed cases, according to the Robert Koch Institute, Germany’s disease control agency, 470 people had been diagnosed with the kidney syndrome.

That could be because German doctors are using a broader definition of kidney failure that captures more cases. Or it could mean that the total number of illnesses is much greater than has so far been revealed, which ultimately would lower the percentage of acute cases. Or it could be a signature of this form of E. coli.

There are many types of E. coli, most of which are harmless. But a small number have come under increasing scrutiny as dangerous pathogens. These all produce a poison known as shiga toxin and generally have the ability to cling to a person’s intestinal wall, allowing them to release the poison in large enough amounts to make people sick.

Dr. Phillip Tarr, a professor of microbiology at the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, said that there were two main forms of shiga toxin found in E. coli, and that the strain detected in the outbreak in Germany appeared to have the more potent version. But he said the organism appeared to have other quirks that made it unusual, and potentially difficult to detect by conventional means.

“This outbreak is still evolving, and everyone is still in the fog of case definition,” Dr. Tarr said. With the source of the contagion unknown, the Robert Koch Institute on Wednesday warned against eating “raw tomatoes, cucumbers and lettuces to prevent further cases,” particularly in northern Germany.

European and German officials pledged to track down the cause of the outbreak and to pinpoint where in the food supply chain the contamination had taken place. “Hundreds of tests have been done,” the German agriculture minister, Ilse Aigner, said in a television interview. So far, those tests had determined that “most of the patients who have fallen ill ate cucumbers, tomatoes and leaf lettuce primarily in northern Germany.”

Alan Cowell reported from Berlin, and William Neuman from New York. Reporting was contributed by James Kanter from Brussels; Victor Homola, Stefan Pauly and Judy Dempsey from Berlin; and Raphael Minder from Motril, Spain.

Article source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=f67842b7c414d4951ec029ea1176e6a1

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