Editorial: Tuberculosis control: did the programme fail or did we fail the programme?

Why Did the Swedish Model Fail?

'From Marx to Market' is not only the title of a well-known book' or a play on words: the slogan can also be used as a telegraphed history of the Swedish labour movement. The late 19th century pioneers of the movement were strongly influenced by German marxists and had as a concrete goal the transfer of the means of production into collective ownership. Their modern followers have abandoned as ...

Did we reach the 2005 targets for tuberculosis control?

The World Health Assembly set targets to detect by 2005 at least 70% of all new sputum smear-positive cases arising each year and to cure at least 85% of these cases. The national tuberculosis (TB) control programmes of 199 countries reported that in 2005, 2.3 million new smear-positive cases were diagnosed under WHOs DOTS strategy, out of an estimated 3.9 million (95% confidence limit (CL) 3.4...

Oxidative Stress in Alzheimer's Disease: Why Did Antioxidant Therapy Fail?

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is the most common form of dementia in the elderly, with increasing prevalence and no disease-modifying treatment available yet. A remarkable amount of data supports the hypothesis that oxidative stress is an early and important pathogenic operator in AD. However, all clinical studies conducted to date did not prove a clear beneficial effect of antioxidant treatment in ...

Public health in interwar England and Wales: did it fail?

British historians initially saw the interwar period as a "golden age" for public health in local government, with unprecedented preventive and curative powers wielded by Medical Officers of Health (MOsH). In the 1980s Lewis and Webster challenged this reading, arguing that MOsH were overstretched, neglectful of their "watchdog" role and incapable of formulating a new philosophy of preventive m...

Unraveling severe sepsis: why did OPTIMIST fail and what's next?