| 1. |
- Munthe, Christian, 1962, et al.
(författare)
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The Return of Lombroso? Ethical Aspects of (Visions of) Preventive Forensic Screening
- 2015
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Ingår i: Public Health Ethics. - : Oxford University Press (OUP). - 1754-9973 .- 1754-9981. ; 8:3, s. 270-283
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The vision of legendary criminologist Cesare Lombroso to use scientific theories of individual causes of crime as a basis for screening and prevention programmes targeting individuals at risk for future criminal behaviour has resurfaced, following advances in genetics, neuroscience and psychiatric epidemiology. This article analyses this idea and maps its ethical implications from a public health ethical standpoint. Twenty-seven variants of the new Lombrosian vision of forensic screening and prevention are distinguished, and some scientific and technical limitations are noted. Some lures, biases and structural factors, making the application of the Lombrosian idea likely in spite of weak evidence are pointed out and noted as a specific type of ethical aspect. Many classic and complex ethical challenges for health screening programmes are shown to apply to the identified variants and the choice between them, albeit with peculiar and often provoking variations. These variations are shown to actualize an underlying theoretical conundrum in need of further study, pertaining to the relationship between public health ethics and the ethics and values of criminal law policy.
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| 2. |
- Nilsson, Thomas, 1954, et al.
(författare)
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The precarious practice of forensic psychiatric risk assessments
- 2009
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Ingår i: International Journal of Law and Psychiatry. - : Elsevier BV. - 0160-2527. ; 32:6, s. 400-407
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The development of forensic psychiatric risk assessments is discussed from a clinical point of view using the example of Sweden. A central task in forensic psychiatry has traditionally been to identify dangerous, mentally disordered subjects considered to be prone to commit violent acts. Over time, “dangerousness” has been reworded into “risk”. Nevertheless, such assessments have generally been based on the psychiatric factors characterising the individual patient, while group interaction, situational factors, or social and cultural circumstances, such as the availability of alcohol and drugs, have been largely overlooked. That risk assessments have a focused on people with a diagnosis of “mental disorder” and been used as grounds for coercive measures and integrity violations has somehow been accepted as a matter of course in the public and political debate. Even the basic question whether offenders with a mental disorder are really more prone to criminal recidivism than other offenders seems to have been treated light-handedly and dealt with merely by epidemiological comparisons between groups of persons with broad ranges of psychosocial vulnerability and the general population. Legal texts, instructions and guidelines from the authorities in charge are often vague and general, while actors in the judicial system seem to put their trust in psychiatric opinions. The exchange of professional opinions, general public expectations, and judicial decision processes poses a huge risk for misunderstandings based on divergent expectations and uses of terminology.
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| 3. |
- Greenbrook, Josephine T. V., 1984, et al.
(författare)
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Medical, Ethical, and Legal Risks in Forensic Age Assessment Procedures in Current Swedish Asylum Processes Involving Unaccompanied Minors
- 2019
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Ingår i: Program and proceedings of the Oxford Global Health & Bioethics International Conference in Oxford, United Kingdom, July 1-2, 2019 (oral presentations).
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Konferensbidrag (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- There is a broad consensus surrounding the acutely vulnerable plight of asylum-seeking unaccompanied children, transcending international policy, academic literature, and expert opinion in both medicine and jurisprudence. Children migrating alone are at extreme risk of exposure to violence, exploitation, and poor health, and thus require extensive social, medical, and legal support, both during migration, and post migration whilst waiting for their asylum claims to be processed. The Swedish government has voiced intent to protect the human right to asylum in Europe, accenting that processes must be solidarity-based, legally certain, sustainable, efficient, and humane in facilitating reliable assessments protecting the rights of asylum-seekers. The present study explores current debate surrounding the deficient scientific reliability of recently introduced two step forensic age assessment procedures in Swedish asylum processes involving unaccompanied minors, and discusses the stakes involved from a medical, ethical, and legal perspective. The analysis included current policy documents, health professions unions' statements and reports, expert and media debate, and United Nations committee reports. Although the vast majority of forensic age assessment conducted thus far in Sweden have assessed biological age as 18 or above, expert consensus has decried methods applied as being unable to withstand the test of scientific scrutiny. Concerns surrounding the procedures’ medically unjustifiable and highly unethical nature, as well as the misuse of the medical profession' authority, expertise, and skill in forwarding political agendas have been noted. Furthermore, in disregarding the precautionary principle by default, current reductionist and pseudoscientific forensic methods risk facilitating the bypassing of laws intended to protect the human rights of children at their most vulnerable. These highly consequential forensic age assessments must yield results greater than chance, as the aftermath of failures are neither humane, sustainable, or legally certain. Flawed results can impede children from accessing foundational human rights, such as the right to health, to thrive, and to meet their full potential, raising resounding medical, ethical, and legal concerns. The social sciences must contribute with expertise and actively engage in this debate, and work toward developing and establishing a thorough and holistic age assessment process, including biomedical aspects such as growth curves, x-rays, and adding psychosocial components such as recollection of childhood memories, psychosocial maturity, along with reports from adults in the children’s social networks (such as teachers, social workers, and others) on how the assessed child handled everyday life.
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| 4. |
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| 5. |
- Munthe, Christian, 1962
(författare)
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Patient Collaboration and Person Centeredness in Forensic Psychiatric Care: An Ethical Map
- 2017
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Ingår i: 35th International Congress on Law and Mental Health, July 9-14, 2017, Prague. Abstracts of the XXX Vth International Congress on Law and Mental Health / David N. Weisstub Editor.
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Konferensbidrag (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- There is increasing interest in applying ideas from person centred care (PCC) in forensic psychiatry, including increased room for patients to collaborate in the care design. However, standard ethical assumptions in PCC about capacities of patients, as well as a traditional health care ethical context, departs significantly from the forensic psychiatric situation. Forensic psychiatric care is beset with restrictions of personal freedom and motivated partly by patients' incapacity to take responsibility brought by mental ill-health, usually within limits from criminal law, public safety and court orders. The care is supposed to change patients to become more autonomous and responsible in order for the restrictions on freedom to be justifiably relaxed or removed. Doing so may involve some room for independent decision-making by patients, using their responsibility capacities, but PCC opens up for much more far-reaching empowerment of patients, e.g., regarding the goals of care and the acceptance of applied methods. Therefore, there is a manifold increase of the ethical complexity creating tensions for PCC already in standard health care. This presentation provides a map of these ethical complexities, focusing especially on the issue of how the central notions of patient empowerment and shared decision-making should imply within forensic psychiatric care.
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| 6. |
- Rizzi, Maria C, et al.
(författare)
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The potential of different countermeasures to prevent injuries with high risk of health loss among bicyclists in Sweden
- 2020
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Ingår i: Traffic Injury Prevention. - : Informa UK Limited. - 1538-9588 .- 1538-957X. ; 21:3, s. 215-221
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Objective: As bicyclists account for the largest share of serious injuries in Sweden, focus to improve safety for bicyclists is needed. While knowledge about fatal bicycle crashes is rather extensive, the number of studies that have investigated non-fatal injuries is still rather limited. The aim of this study was to estimate the potential of different countermeasures to reduce crashes resulting in injuries with high risk of health-loss among cyclists in Sweden. A further aim was to describe the residual—that is, crashes that were not considered to be addressed by the analyzed countermeasures. Methods: A sample of individuals with specific injury diagnoses was drawn from the Swedish national crash database Strada. A survey form was used to collect additional information about the crash and the health-related outcomes. The potential of countermeasures currently included in the Swedish Safety Performance Indicators, as well as of countermeasures that could be described as “existing but not fully implemented” was assessed. The overall potential of all countermeasures assessed was calculated, giving a grand total without double counting. Cases that were considered not to be addressed by any of the countermeasures included (i.e., the residual crashes) were described in more detail. Results: The current Swedish Safety Performance Indicators that relate to safe cycling addressed 22% of crashes. Improved maintenance by deicing and removal of snow from bicycle infrastructure was found to have the highest potential (8%), followed by improved crashworthiness of passenger cars (5%) and safer bicycle crossings (4%). The potential for existing but not fully implemented safety improvements was 56%. The greatest potential was found for Autonomous Emergency Braking with cyclist detection for passenger cars (12%), followed by studded winter tyres for bicycles (12%), and improved maintenance on non-bicycle infrastructure (11%). In total, taking double counting into consideration, all safety improvements could address 64% of all crashes. Among the residual crashes, the majority (69%) were single bicycle crashes of which most were related to wheel locking during braking and losing balance at low speed or stationary. Conclusions: Compared with fatal crashes that involve a majority of bicycle-car crashes, the crashes leading to health-loss are mostly single bicycle crashes. Therefore, innovation and development of additional countermeasures to improve safety for bicyclists should focus on single bicycle crashes.
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| 7. |
- Kjeldgård, Linnea, 1985-, et al.
(författare)
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Diagnosis-specific sickness absence among injured working-aged pedestrians: a sequence analysis
- 2023
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Ingår i: BMC Public Health. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 1471-2458. ; 23:1, s. 367-
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- BACKGROUND: The knowledge about the long-term consequences in terms of sickness absence (SA) among pedestrians injured in a traffic-related accident, including falls, is scarce. Therefore, the aim was to explore diagnosis-specific patterns of SA during a four-year period and their association with different sociodemographic and occupational factors among all individuals of working ages who were injured as a pedestrian. METHODS: A nationwide register-based study, including all individuals aged 20-59 and living in Sweden, who in 2014-2016 had in- or specialized outpatient healthcare after a new traffic-related accident as a pedestrian. Diagnosis-specific SA (> 14 days) was assessed weekly from one year before the accident up until three years after the accident. Sequence analysis was used to identify patterns (sequences) of SA, and cluster analysis to form clusters of individuals with similar sequences. Odds ratios (ORs) with 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for association of the different factors and cluster memberships were estimated by multinomial logistic regression. RESULTS: In total, 11,432 pedestrians received healthcare due to a traffic-related accident. Eight clusters of SA patterns were identified. The largest cluster was characterized by no SA, three clusters had different SA patterns due to injury diagnoses (immediate, episodic, and later). One cluster had SA both due to injury and other diagnoses. Two clusters had SA due to other diagnoses (short-term and long-term) and one cluster mainly consisted of individuals with disability pension (DP). Compared to the cluster "No SA", all other clusters were associated with older age, no university education, having been hospitalized, and working in health and social care. The clusters "Immediate SA", "Episodic SA" and "Both SA due to injury and other diagnoses" were also associated with higher odds of pedestrians who sustained a fracture. CONCLUSIONS: This nationwide study of the working-aged pedestrians observed diverging patterns of SA after their accident. The largest cluster of pedestrians had no SA, and the other seven clusters had different patterns of SA in terms of diagnosis (injury and other diagnoses) and timing of SA. Differences were found between all clusters regarding sociodemographic and occupational factors. This information can contribute to the understanding of long-term consequences of road traffic accidents.
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| 8. |
- Lindhe, Andreas, 1981, et al.
(författare)
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Användningen av MACRO-DB i tillståndsärenden och effekter av ny modellversion: Enkätstudie och samhällsekonomisk analys av arbetet med MACRO-DB
- 2022
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Rapport (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- I syfte att skydda dricksvattentäkter, dvs. yt- och grundvattenresurser, kan användningen av växtskyddsmedel regleras genom att exempelvis ställa krav på tillstånd för yrkesmässig användning inom vattenskyddsområden. Att bedöma när, hur och vilka växtskyddsmedel som kan spridas kan vara komplicerat. För att underlätta arbetet med att både ta fram och handlägga tillståndsärenden finns därför modellverktyget MACRO-DB. Verktyget har utvecklats av SLU Centrum för kemiska bekämpningsmedel i miljön (CKB) och används för att simulera bekämpningsmedelsläckage till yt- och grundvatten och bedöma om risken är acceptabelt låg eller inte. År 2018 gjordes en satsning där både Havs- och vattenmyndigheten (HaV) och CKB gjorde investeringar för att vidareutveckla MACRO-DB. Syftet med analysen som presenteras i denna rapport har varit att utvärdera om satsningen varit samhällsekonomiskt motiverad med hjälp av en kostnads-nyttoanalys (KNA). För att ta fram nödvändigt underlag och ge en bild av dagens arbete med tillståndsärenden för yrkesmässig användning av växtskyddsmedel på jordbruksmark inom vattenskyddsområden har en enkätundersökning genomförts. Enkäten skickades till samtliga svenska kommuner och syftade specifikt till att kartlägga användningen av MACRO-DB. Den genomförda enkätstudien besvarades av 58 % av Sveriges kommuner och bedöms baserat på detta och den geografiska spridningen ge en bra bild av dagens arbete med tillståndsärenden för användning av växtskyddsmedel på jordbruksmark inom vattenskyddsområden och specifikt användningen av MACRO-DB. Av de kommuner som besvarat enkäten är det 71 % som handlägger den aktuella typen av ärenden och av dessa är det 61 % som använder MACRO-DB som del av beslutsunderlaget. En majoritet av kommunerna använder såldes MACRO-DB. Bland de som inte använder MACRO-DB beror det framför allt på att man inte känner verktyget. Endast en mindre andel anser att det är inte rimligt att ställa krav på användning av MACRO-DB i den typ av ärenden de hanterar. Av de kommuner som använder MACRO-DB gör 55 % egna körningar för att kontrollera resultaten som lämnas in med tillståndsansökningarna. En stor andel (44 %) gör i stället granskningar av underlagsmaterial och antaganden. Enligt drygt hälften (53 %) av kommunerna tar dricksvattenproducenten del av uppgifter om vilka växtskyddsmedel som används inom vattenskyddsområden, i syfte att anpassa kontrollen av förekomst av växtskyddsmedelsrester i rå- och dricksvatten. Resultaten från enkäten visar också att majoriteten av kommunerna som använder MACRO-DB (93 %) anser att verktyget fungerar bra (61 %) eller mycket bra (32 %) som hjälpmedel. De förslag som lämnats på hur användningen skulle kunna förbättras innefattar bland annat behov av utbildning och annan stöttning men även behovet av mindre tidskrävande simuleringar. Att reducera simuleringstiden har varit ett av syftena med den uppdatering av MACRO-DB som gjorts och är en av de nyttor som ingår i den genomförda KNA:n. I analysen har fokus varit på följande kostnader och nyttor: (i) investeringarna som HaV och CKB gjort, (ii) tidsvinster som den nya modellversionen ger för kommuner, rådgivare och andra aktörer, (iii) möjliga effekter av en ökad livsmedelproduktion om det blir möjligt att söka tillstånd för spridning av växtskyddsmedel på odlingsmark där det idag råder förbud, och (iv) förlust av miljönyttor som en ökad spridning av växtskyddsmedel kan ge upphov till. Utifrån de antaganden som scenarierna i KNA:n bygger på bedöms nyttorna kunna överstiga kostnaderna, vilket alltså indikerar att satsningen på nya MACRO-DB kan vara samhällsekonomiskt motiverad. Skillnaden mellan nyttor och kostnader är samtidigt inte så betydande att ett annat resultat helt kan uteslutas, det vill säga att kostnaderna skulle kunna överstiga nyttorna. Scenarierna bygger på flera antaganden som är osäkra och de presenterade resultaten över samhällsekonomisk lönsamhet bör därför tolkas med viss försiktighet. Det kan dock konstateras att nyttorna till följd av tidsbesparingar är i samma storleksordning som investeringskostnaderna, vilket innebär att satsningen kan vara samhällsekonomiskt även om endast dessa aspekter beaktas. Osäkerheterna bedöms vara störst i de uppskattade nyttorna av ökad livsmedelsproduktion samt de minskade miljönyttorna. Dessa poster i KNA:n beskriver för- respektive nackdelarna som uppstår om det blir möjligt att söka tillstånd för spridning av växtskyddsmedel på odlingsmark där det idag rådet förbud. Resultaten visar att även dessa nyttor och kostnader är i samma storleksordning. Det kan därför konstateras att såväl möjligheten att bruka marken för livsmedelproduktion som skyddet av yt- och grundvattenresurser är förknippade med stora nyttor. Skyddet av yt- och grundvattenresurserna behöver därför säkerställas samtidigt som åtgärderna inte ska vara onödigt långtgående så att de ger orimliga restriktioner i markanvändningen och i detta fall effekter på livsmedelproduktionen. Verktyg och hjälpmedel som MACRO-DB är därför viktiga för att möjliggöra en rimlig avvägning när risken spridning av växtskyddsmedel kan tillåtas och när det inte är rimligt. I handläggningen av tillståndsärenden och avvägningar om det ska råda förbud eller krav på tillstånd är den inte bara spridningen av växtskyddsmedel som behöver beaktas utan även övriga förutsättningar och risker som hanteringen av växtskyddsmedel är förknippad med.
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| 9. |
- Lindgren, Petter, et al.
(författare)
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A likelihood ratio-based approach for improved source attribution in microbiological forensic investigations
- 2019
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Ingår i: Forensic Science International. - : Elsevier. - 0379-0738 .- 1872-6283. ; 302
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- A common objective in microbial forensic investigations is to identify the origin of a recovered pathogenic bacterium by DNA sequencing. However, there is currently no consensus about how degrees of belief in such origin hypotheses should be quantified, interpreted, and communicated to wider audiences. To fill this gap, we have developed a concept based on calculating probabilistic evidential values for microbial forensic hypotheses. The likelihood-ratio method underpinning this concept is widely used in other forensic fields, such as human DNA matching, where results are readily interpretable and have been successfully communicated in juridical hearings. The concept was applied to two case scenarios of interest in microbial forensics: (1) identifying source cultures among series of very similar cultures generated by parallel serial passage of the Tier 1 pathogen Francisella tularensis, and (2) finding the production facilities of strains isolated in a real disease outbreak caused by the human pathogen Listeria monocytogenes. Evidence values for the studied hypotheses were computed based on signatures derived from whole genome sequencing data, including deep-sequenced low-frequency variants and structural variants such as duplications and deletions acquired during serial passages. In the F. tularensis case study, we were able to correctly assign fictive evidence samples to the correct culture batches of origin on the basis of structural variant data. By setting up relevant hypotheses and using data on cultivated batch sources to define the reference populations under each hypothesis, evidential values could be calculated. The results show that extremely similar strains can be separated on the basis of amplified mutational patterns identified by high-throughput sequencing. In the L. monocytogenes scenario, analyses of whole genome sequence data conclusively assigned the clinical samples to specific sources of origin, and conclusions were formulated to facilitate communication of the findings. Taken together, these findings demonstrate the potential of using bacterial whole genome sequencing data, including data on both low frequency SNP signatures and structural variants, to calculate evidence values that facilitate interpretation and communication of the results. The concept could be applied in diverse scenarios, including both epidemiological and forensic source tracking of bacterial infectious disease outbreaks.
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| 10. |
- Munthe, Christian, 1962
(författare)
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Hate Crime, Mental Disorder and Criminal Responsibility
- 2017
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Ingår i: Edward Dunbar, Amalio Blanco, Desirée A. Crèvecoeur-MacPhail, Christian Munthe, Michael Fingerle, David Brax (eds.), The Psychology of Hate Crimes as Domestic Terrorism: U.S. and Global Issues, vol. 1. - Santa Barbara, CA : Praeger. - 9781440845598 ; , s. 225-238
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Bokkapitel (refereegranskat)
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