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This paper examines the principal factors affecting the growth of intra‐group trade for four Latin American and Caribbean economic groups. Its findings suggest that the share of a group member's leading export sold within the group is an important determinant of intra‐group trade. For member countries that depend heavily on extra‐group markets, intra‐group trade is indirectly affected by the impact of extra‐group trade on gross domestic product.

In the medical world, statistical visualisation has largely been confined to the realm of relatively simple geographical applications. This remains the case, even though hospitals have been collecting spatial data relating to patients. In particular, hospitals have a wealth of back pain information, which includes pain drawings, usually detailing the spatial distribution and type of pain suffered by back‐pain patients. Proposes several technological solutions, which permit data within back‐pain datasets to be digitally linked to the pain drawings in order to provide methods of computer‐based data management and analysis. In particular, proposes the use of geographical information systems (GIS), up till now a tool used mainly in the geographic and cartographic domains, to provide novel and powerful ways of visualising and managing back‐pain data. A comparative evaluation of the proposed solutions shows that, although adding complexity and cost, the GIS‐based solution is the one most appropriate for visualisation and analysis of back‐pain datasets.

At a recent inquest upon the body of a woman who was alleged to have died as the result of taking certain drugs for an improper purpose, one of the witnesses described himself as “an analyst and manufacturing chemist,” but when asked by the coroner what qualifications he had, he replied : “I have no qualifications whatever. What I know I learned from my father, who was a well‐known ‘F.C.S.’” Comment on the “F.C.S.” is needless.

The racial diversity of the Caribbean stemmed directly from the historical processes of colonialism, imperialism, slavery, and indentureship. Since the early 17th century, slaves have been imported from Africa to work in the Caribbean. In the British West Indies, slavery was abolished in 1834 but these African slaves worked on the sugar estates until the apprenticeship was abolished on August 1, 1838. Even before 1838, planters frequently complained of labor shortages and appealed to Britain for the approval of imported labor. Thus, there were attempts by the planters in colonies, such as Trinidad, to introduce Chinese labor to the plantations. As early as 1806, there was the importation of 192 Chinese from Macao and Penang into Trinidad. However, this experiment soon failed. In 1834 and 1839, laborers from Portugal were imported into Trinidad. This soon ended as Portuguese workers could not withstand the rigorous conditions of the contract labor system.