Digital finance and M&As: An empirical study and mechanism analysis.

With the rapid growth and wide application of digital technology, enterprises have entered the digital era with both opportunities and challenges existing. Mergers and acquisitions are one of the most efficient ways to integrate resources and achieve profit growth, giving enterprises advantages in competing in the new mode of economic growth. Based on this, this research tries to explore whether the development of digital finance will contribute to the emergence of M&As activities through combining M&As data of the Chinese stock market with the digital finance inclusion index between 2012 and 2020. The results show that the development of digital finance largely influences M&As activities through lower acquirers' financial constraints. We further replace digital finance with three sub-indexes including coverage breadth, usage depth, and digitalization level to explore the impact of different dimensions of digital finance on M&As. Results show that coverage breadth plays a more important role. In addition, heterogeneity tests reveal that the relationship between the development of digital finance and M&As activities varies significantly. The influences of digital finance on private and western and central enterprises are more significant compared with state-owned and eastern enterprises. According to the study, since the development of digital finance can be an efficient way to ease financial constraints and boost M&As activities, the government should promote the development of digital finance while companies strive to make the most use of it.

Southern Care: A Rapid Response to Supporting Southern CBOs at the onset of COVID-19.

Southern community-based and HIV/AIDS service organizations (CBOs) were particularly vulnerable to the onset of COVID-19 due to already fragile infrastructures and underfunded budgets. At the height of the pandemic, the Gilead COMPASS Coordinating Centers launched the Southern CARE Grant, awarding 41 grants to provide supplemental operational support funds.

"Do Their Own Thing": Radical Health Care and the Fair Haven Community Health Center.

Radical health reform movements of the 1960s inspired two widely adopted alternative health care models in the United States: free clinics and community health centers. These groundbreaking institutions attempted to realize bold ideals but faced financial, bureaucratic, and political obstacles. This article examines the history of Fair Haven Community Health Care (FHCHC) in New Haven, Connecticut, an organization that spanned both models and typified innovative aspects of each while resisting the forces that tempered many of its contemporaries' progressive practices. Motivated by a tradition of independence and struggling to address medical neglect in their neighborhood, FHCHC leaders chose not to affiliate with the local academic hospital, a decision that led many disaffected community members to embrace the clinic. The FHCHC also prioritized grant funding over fee-for-service revenue, thus retaining freedom to implement creative programs. Furthermore, the center functioned in an egalitarian manner, enthusiastically employing nurse practitioners and whole-staff meetings, and was largely able to avoid the conflicts that strained other community-controlled organizations. The FHCHC proved unusual among free clinics and health centers and demonstrated strategies similar institutions might employ to overcome common challenges. (Am J Public Health. 2021;111(10): 1806-1814. https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2021.306417).

Climbing the grants ladder: Funding opportunities for surgeons.

Surgeon-scientists provide critical perspectives to academic medicine, both as lead scientists and as collaborators. Successfully applying for and obtaining funding is critical to sustain a research program; however, significant challenges exist. It is imperative to be aware of and consider all funding sources available to surgeons during the evolution of one's career. Additionally, a deep understanding of intramural and extramural nonfinancial resources, such as mentorship relationships, grant writing, and career development courses, and research infrastructure are required. In this article, we present a set of recommendations and guidelines for surgeon-scientists to leverage funding resources with active planning longitudinally during their careers to sustain their research programs and provide their unique perspectives on surgical disease to the scientific community.

Significance and innovation: cornerstones of a successful grant application.

The Significance and Innovation sections of a grant application are the cornerstones to a successful application. These sections emphasize the importance of the problem being studied, highlight what is novel about the proposal, and are an opportunity to get the reviewers excited about the application. To the novice grant writer, it may be difficult to know what "Significance" and "Innovation" are meant to describe. In this article we define the role of the Significance and Innovation sections and provide suggestions on what to include in each section and potential pitfalls to avoid.

Has resourcing of non-governmental harm-reduction organizations in Ukraine improved HIV prevention and treatment outcomes for people who inject drugs? Findings from multiple bio-behavioural surveys.

INTRODUCTION: People who inject drugs (PWID) in Ukraine have high prevalences of HIV and hepatitis C (HCV). Since the turn of the century, various organizations have funded non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in Ukraine to provide PWID with needles and syringes, condoms, HIV and HCV testing, and improve linkage to opioid agonist therapy (OAT) and HIV treatment. We investigated whether contact with these NGOs was associated with improved HIV prevention and treatment outcomes among PWID. METHODS: Five rounds of respondent-driven sampled integrated bio-behavioural survey data (2009 [N = 3962], 2011 [N = 9069], 2013 [N = 9502], 2015 [N = 9405], and 2017 [N = 10076]) among PWID in Ukraine (including HIV/HCV testing and questionnaires) were analysed using mixed-effect logistic regression models (mixed-effects: city, year). These regression models assessed associations between being an NGO client and various behavioural, OAT, HIV testing and HIV treatment outcomes, adjusting for demographic characteristics (age, gender, lifetime imprisonment, registration in a drug abuse clinic, education level). We also assessed associations between being an NGO client and being HIV positive or HCV positive, likewise adjusting for demographic characteristics (as above). RESULTS: NGO clients were more likely to have received HIV testing ever (adjusted odds ratio [aOR] 5.37, 95% confidence interval [95% CI]: 4.97 to 5.80) or in the last year (aOR 3.37, 95% CI: 3.20 to 3.54), to have used condoms at last sexual intercourse (aOR 1.37, 95% CI: 1.30 to 1.44) and sterile needles at last injection (aOR 1.37, 95% CI: 1.20 to 1.56), to be currently (aOR 4.19, 95% CI: 3.48 to 5.05) or ever (aOR 2.52, 95% CI: 2.32 to 2.74) on OAT, and to have received syringes (aOR 109.89, 95% CI: 99.26 to 121.66) or condoms (aOR 54.39, 95% CI: 50.17 to 58.96) in the last year. PWID who were HIV positive (aOR 1.40, 95% CI: 1.33 to 1.48) or HCV positive (aOR 1.57, 95% CI: 1.49 to 1.65) were more likely to have contact with NGOs, with HIV positive PWID in contact with NGOs being more likely to be registered at AIDS centres (aOR 2.34, 95% CI: 1.88 to 2.92) and to be on antiretroviral therapy (aOR 1.60, 95% CI: 1.40 to 1.83). CONCLUSIONS: Contact with PWID targeted NGOs in Ukraine is associated with consistently better preventive, HIV testing and HIV treatment outcomes, suggesting a beneficial impact of harm reduction NGO programming.