Factors affecting risk perception about drinking water and response to public notification

Contamination of drinking water occurs despite strict regulations, yet few studies have been conducted to assess the public's perception of risk about drinking water. The purpose of this study was to assess risk perception associated with drinking water supplied by small water systems and to determine alternative measures that people take in response to public notification (PN). The study also explored whether health belief model (HBM) variables and general risk perception about drinking water, were significant predictors of response to PN. Participants were selected from four small Oregon cities (one with a long-term filtration problem and the other with a short-term contamination problem) and two cities without such problems using a stratified random sampling technique. A total of 391 telephone interviews were completed for an average response rate of 69 percent. Results indicated higher risk perception about drinking water among residents of the city with a long-term drinking water problem (Falls City) when compared to the city with a short-term problem (Jefferson) (p=.008). A higher proportion of residents in Jefferson than in Falls City responded to the PN by boiling water (p=.O11), and by taking any action (p=.023) in response to PN. There was a significant difference between the cities with respect to regular bottled water consumption patterns (p=.0002), with Falls City showing the highest mean ranking for bottled water consumption, of all the cities. Logistic regression analysis supported the HBM variables perceived seriousness (OR=2.05, p=.O01), and household size (OR=2.2; p=.027) as predictors of response to PN by taking any action. Perceived seriousness (OR 0.5; p=.004) and income (OR= 2.3; p=.000) emerged as preditors of response to PN by drinking bottled water. General risk perception was a significant negative predictor of response to PN by boiling water (OR=0.57; p=.O19). Mail from the city water utility, county health department and newspapers were the top three sources respondents used to obtain information about drinking water. In all the cities, three quarters of the respondents indicated willingness to pay for the improvement of drinking water, particularly to correct problems related to chemical and microbiological contamination

The Stability of Prime Money Market Mutual Funds: Sponsor Support from 2007 to 2011

Federal Reserve Bank of Boston: Risk and Policy Analysis Uni

Bottled Water: United States Consumers and Their Perceptions of Water Quality

Consumption of bottled water is increasing worldwide. Prior research shows many consumers believe bottled water is convenient and has better taste than tap water, despite reports of a number of water quality incidents with bottled water. The authors explore the demographic and social factors associated with bottled water users in the U.S. and the relationship between bottled water use and perceptions of the quality of local water supply. They find that U.S. consumers are more likely to report bottled water as their primary drinking water source when they perceive that drinking water is not safe. Furthermore, those who give lower ratings to the quality of their ground water are more likely to regularly purchase bottle water for drinking and use bottle water as their primary drinking water source

What matters most? Stakeholders’ perceptions of river water quality

The need to integrate stakeholders’ views into environmental policy is increasingly gaining attention because this offers the opportunity to design sustainable and synergistic environmental strategies. Understanding and integrating the views of resource users into policy design and implementation could help address the most important challenges, gain community support, enhance project ownership, and avoid policies being rejected by local people. As a result, research in environmental management has focussed on stakeholders’ perceptions of river water quality and how to integrate such views into policy. While existing studies offer insights into the different ways in which stakeholders evaluate river water quality and potential factors influencing judgements, they appear to be limited in a number of ways. First, most of these studies focus on developed countries and may have limited contextual relevance to the developing world. Moreover, past studies focus on segments of society such as farmers and mainly on wastewater for agriculture. These shortcomings may limit our understanding of the topic and our ability to design effective policies to address water quality problems. Drawing on survey data from the Wenchi municipality in Ghana, we examine public perceptions of what constitute important measures of river water quality as well as factors influencing such judgements. Results suggest that while variables such as taste, colour, smell and litter are important, the presence of faecal matter in and/or around the river was rated the most important measure of river water quality while depth of river was the least important. Results further suggest that education, age, number of years a person had lived in a community, depth of river and the presence of aquatic vegetation influence water quality judgements. The findings of this research provide insights into what policymakers and regulators need to consider when attempting to influence behaviours in relation to water resources. We note, however, that while public perceptions of river water quality could guide water management policies, scientific measurements of water quality must not be replaced with stakeholder perceptions. This is because aspects such as ecological integrity may not be important to segments of the public but are an important aspect of water management. This is reinforced in the present study as there seems to be a lack of concern among the participants regarding river depth – an important factor for habitat provision and pollution dilution

Investigating the mechanism of anticancer activity of brefeldin A

Brefeldin A (BFA) is a naturally occurring macrolide with anticancer, antifungal, and antiviral effects. The mechanism(s) of action by which BFA elicits its many biological activities is not clearly understood, and this limits its development as a chemotherapeutic agent. The drug therefore is an exceptional research subject for many reasons. First, the BFA scaffold was used to develop drugs based on a pharmacophore model to afford controlled biological activity and increased drug specificity. Ester derivatives of BFA were synthesized and the compounds were tested for antiproliferative activity against the National Cancer Institute\u27s 60 cancer cell lines. Mono-derivatization at the C4 and C7 alcohols was tolerated, yielding biologically active compounds. The BFA ester conjugates synthesized in this study were cytotoxic to cancer cells, and our results prove that the disruption of the Golgi complex is not necessary for cytotoxicity. These analogues demonstrate differential biological effects and could be selecting different mechanisms of action than BFA itself. Second, the study presented an opportunity to investigate the variety of biological pathways targeted by BFA which gave further insight into the mechanism of action, particularly for eliciting the drug\u27s anticancer properties. The role of BFA as an interfacial inhibitor that interrupts the activation cycle of small GTPases was investigated. These proteins regulate several signaling pathways and are crucial for cell survival. We found that BFA treatment resulted in decreased levels of activated GTPases. This may be the means by which BFA disrupts cellular signaling and induces apoptosis. Finally, the use of BFA as an exploratory tool afforded access to present biological targets for the development of more selective chemotherapeutic agents. BFA was immobilized on a solid support and used in affinity chromatography experiments to isolate proteins which interacted with the drug. Small GTPase protein complexes and apoptosic signaling proteins were identified as BFA targets. The proteome of drug-treated cells was analyzed to determine which proteins were affected by BFA. Proteins identified in this manner included some of the proteins captured on the affinity beads, and thus confirmed their relationship with the drug