Benefits Trafficking: human trafficking of older adults and adults with disabilities.

An emerging type of trafficking is targeting overlooked at-risk adults. Benefits Trafficking is the systematic recruitment, harboring, neglect, and financial exploitation of elder and disabled adults who receive government benefits such as Social Security, Veteran's Benefits, Medicaid, and Medicare. Traffickers often pose as kind-hearted individuals offering to provide care for at-risk adults in an in-home setting. Once recruited, at-risk adults are stripped of their government benefits, held against their will, moved from location to location, and denied basic needs such as food, clothing, and adequate shelter. While Benefits Trafficking is a basic civil rights violation issue, it is also a growing public health issue. Victims of Benefits Trafficking are often the forgotten at-risk adults who have fallen through the cracks of various mental health systems, are unhoused, and no longer have a social support system in place. This area of human trafficking is unresearched and its prevalence is largely unknown outside of the few entities working in this space. This paper focuses mainly on raising awareness of Benefits Trafficking and suggestions for future funding and research initiatives.

The impact of exposure to wagering advertisements and inducements on intended and actual betting expenditure: An ecological momentary assessment study.

BACKGROUND AND AIMS: Research suggests that a large proportion of regular sports and race bettors experience harm related to their gambling. In Australia, people who bet regularly are targeted by a proliferation of different forms of inducements and advertising - many of which are believed to encourage excessive betting and erroneous perceptions of risk. However, scant research has examined the impact of marketing messaging to this group, which is also limited to cross-sectional or qualitative designs. We aimed to determine whether exposure to wagering advertisements and inducements influenced intended betting expenditure, actual betting expenditure, and spending more than intended. METHODS: We report on an ecological momentary assessment study, measuring regular exposure to 20 different forms of marketing, as well as wagering spend from 318 race bettors and 279 sports bettors. Up to 15 assessments per participant were conducted over 3 weeks (mean = 11.46, median = 14), yielding 6,843 observations for analysis. RESULTS: Exposure to advertising and inducements was reliably linked to a greater likelihood of betting, higher intended and actual betting expenditure, and spending more than intended. "Push" messaging and inducements that convey the impression of reduced risk (stake-back inducements and multibet offers) were particularly influential, as well as brands promoted during events and advertisements on betting websites/apps. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS: Given that a large proportion of regular sports and race bettors experience problems, restrictions on these forms of marketing are advisable. These findings suggest that this is particularly important for marketing that is "pushed" to gamblers or that suggests reduced risk.

Where's the Bonus in Bonus Bets? Assessing Sports Bettors' Comprehension of their True Cost.

Wagering inducements with bonus bets are prominently marketed and often have play-through conditions requiring further expenditure. However, these conditions are not usually presented in the inducement advertisement and may be difficult to locate. The play-through conditions themselves are complex and may lead bettors to miscalculate the inducement's true cost. Therefore, in relation to inducements with bonus bets, this study aimed to assess: (1) whether their perceived attractiveness varies with the amount and type of information provided about their play-through conditions; (2) bettors' comprehension of their true cost; and (3) whether bettors' comprehension of their true cost varies with problem gambling severity. A sample of 299 Australian sports bettors completed an online survey and rated the attractiveness of three variations of an inducement. Promo1 simply noted that "terms and conditions apply"; promo2 included the terms and conditions immediately below the offer; and promo3 revealed the true cost of the offer. Respondents were asked to calculate the true cost before this was revealed. The study found that detailing key terms and conditions for an offer directly below the advertisement impacts negatively on its perceived attractiveness. Moreover, nearly three in five bettors underestimated the additional amount they would need to bet to access any winnings from the bonus bet. No significant differences were found amongst gambler risk groups. The results imply that current approaches to marketing these inducements are likely to lead consumers to overestimate their attractiveness and underestimate their cost. To enhance responsible gambling practice, these promotional offers should be presented in ways that enable informed decision-making.

Gambling Participation, Expenditure and Risk of Harm in Australia, 1997-1998 and 2010-2011.

Gambling-related harm results primarily from financial losses. Internationally Australia continues to rank as the largest spending nation per capita on gambling products. This would suggest that Australian gamblers are at disproportionately high risk of harm despite almost two decades of industry scrutiny and regulation, and investment in research, treatment and education programs. However, declines in participation rates, per capita expenditure, household expenditure, national disposable income spent on gambling and problem gambling rates have been cited as evidence that fewer people are gambling, that gamblers are spending less, and that gambling safety in Australia has improved. The current study investigated these propositions using national population and accounts data, and statistics from Australia's two population-representative gambling surveys conducted in 1997-1998 and 2010-2011. Despite a falling participation rate the study found no real change in the number of people gambling overall, and increasing numbers consuming casino table games, race wagering and sports betting. Further found were increases rather than decreases in average gambler expenditure, overall, and across most products, particularly electronic gaming machines (EGMs). Potentially risky levels of average expenditure were observed in both periods, overall and for race wagering, casino table gaming, and EGMs. Changes in the proportion of income spent on gambling suggest risks declined overall and for race wagering and casino table gaming, but increased for EGMs. Finally, while problem gambling statistics were not comparable between periods, the study found double the number of moderate risk gamblers previously estimated for 2010-2011 amongst the 2 million Australians found to have experienced one or more gambling-related problems. The findings have implications for public health policy and resourcing, and the way in which prevalence and expenditure statistics have been interpreted by researchers, government and industry in Australia and elsewhere.

Neuroscience in gambling policy and treatment: an interdisciplinary perspective.

Neuroscientific explanations of gambling disorder can help people make sense of their experiences and guide the development of psychosocial interventions. However, the societal perceptions and implications of these explanations are not always clear or helpful. Two workshops in 2013 and 2014 brought together multidisciplinary researchers aiming to improve the clinical and policy-related effects of neuroscience research on gambling. The workshops revealed that neuroscience can be used to improve identification of the dangers of products used in gambling. Additionally, there was optimism associated with the diagnostic and prognostic uses of neuroscience in problem gambling and the provision of novel tools (eg, virtual reality) to assess the effectiveness of new policy interventions before their implementation. Other messages from these workshops were that neuroscientific models of decision making could provide a strong rationale for precommitment strategies and that interdisciplinary collaborations are needed to reduce the harms of gambling.

Molecular characterization of boscalid- and penthiopyrad-resistant isolates of Didymella bryoniae and assessment of their sensitivity to fluopyram.

BACKGROUND: Didymella bryoniae has a history of developing resistance to single-site fungicides. A recent example is with the succinate-dehydrogenase-inhibiting fungicide (SDHI) boscalid. In laboratory assays, out of 103 isolates of this fungus, 82 and seven were found to be very highly resistant (B(VHR) ) and highly resistant (B(HR) ) to boscalid respectively. Cross-resistance studies with the new SDHI penthiopyrad showed that the B(VHR) isolates were only highly resistant to penthiopyrad (B(VHR) -P(HR) ), while the B(HR) isolates appeared sensitive to penthiopyrad (B(HR) -P(S) ). In this study, the molecular mechanism of resistance in these two phenotypes (B(VHR) -P(HR) and B(HR) -P(S) ) was elucidated, and their sensitivity to the new SDHI fluopyram was assessed. RESULTS: A 456 bp cDNA amplified fragment of the succinate dehydrogenase iron sulfur gene (DbSDHB) was initially cloned and sequenced from two sensitive (B(S) -P(S) ), two B(VHR) -P(HR) and one B(HR) -P(S) isolate of D. bryoniae. Comparative analysis of the DbSDHB protein revealed that a highly conserved histidine residue involved in the binding of SDHIs and present in wild-type isolates was replaced by tyrosine (H277Y) or arginine (H277R) in the B(VHR) -P(HR) and B(HR) -P(S) variants respectively. Further examination of the role and extent of these alterations showed that the H/Y and H/R substitutions were present in the remaining B(VHR) -P(HR) and B(HR) -P(S) variants respectively. Analysis of the sensitivity to fluopyram of representative isolates showed that both SDHB mutants were sensitive to this fungicide as the wild-type isolates. CONCLUSION: The genotype-specific cross-resistance relationships between the SDHIs boscalid and penthiopyrad and the lack of cross-resistance between these fungicides and fluopyram should be taken into account when selecting SDHIs for gummy stem blight management.