Can we study the family environment through census data? A comparison of households, dwellings, and domestic units in rural Mali.

Are 'statistical households', as defined in national censuses, able to describe the family environment in Africa? Do they correspond to the family units that individuals identify with? To address this issue, we build on a follow-up survey in south-east Mali, which links national censuses with local censuses at the individual level (N ≈ 28,000 census observations). Three cross-sectional snapshots of family arrangements are compared: households recorded in national censuses, and family economic units and residential units recorded by local censuses. The national census household data appear poorly suited to documenting family living arrangements.

Intimate ties of people living with HIV in France resulted both from social status and the experience of being HIV-infected: results from the ANRS-Vespa2 study, France.

Based on data from the ANRS-Vespa2 study, conducted among a representative sample of PLWHIV (France, 2011), we studied intimate ties with relatives and friends and their determinants. Six social network profiles were identified, with a clear association with socioepidemiological groups: the most surrounded individuals were MSM, and the most isolated ones were sub-Saharan African migrants (especially women). Social networks were shaped both by material socioeconomic status and HIV experience: involvement in PLWHIV organizations, disclosure of HIV infection, and the experience of discrimination.

Mortality inequality in populations with equal life expectancy: Arriaga's decomposition method in SAS, Stata, and Excel.

Purpose: Life expectancy is used to measure population health, but large differences in mortality can be masked even when there is no life expectancy gap. We demonstrate how Arriaga's decomposition method can be used to assess inequality in mortality between populations with near equal life expectancy.

Methods: We calculated life expectancy at birth for Quebec and the rest of Canada from 2005 to 2009 using life tables and partitioned the gap between both populations into age and cause-specific components using Arriaga's method.