Core components for effective infection prevention and control programmes: new WHO evidence-based recommendations

Abstract Health care-associated infections (HAI) are a major public health problem with a significant impact on morbidity, mortality and quality of life. They represent also an important economic burden to health systems worldwide. However, a large proportion of HAI are preventable through effective infection prevention and control (IPC) measures. Improvements in IPC at the national and facility level are critical for the successful containment of antimicrobial resistance and the prevention of HAI, including outbreaks of highly transmissible diseases through high quality care within the context of universal health coverage. Given the limited availability of IPC evidence-based guidance and standards, the World Health Organization (WHO) decided to prioritize the development of global recommendations on the core components of effective IPC programmes both at the national and acute health care facility level, based on systematic literature reviews and expert consensus. The aim of the guideline development process was to identify the evidence and evaluate its quality, consider patient values and preferences, resource implications, and the feasibility and acceptability of the recommendations. As a result, 11 recommendations and three good practice statements are presented here, including a summary of the supporting evidence, and form the substance of a new WHO IPC guideline

Self-authorship and creative industries workers’ career decision-making

Career decision-making is arguably at its most complex within professions where work is precarious and career calling is strong. This article reports from a study that examined the career decision-making of creative industries workers, for whom career decisions can impact psychological well-being and identity just as much as they impact individuals’ work and career. The respondents were 693 creative industries workers who used a largely open-ended survey to create in-depth reflections on formative moments and career decision-making. Analysis involved the theoretical model of self-authorship, which provides a way of understanding how people employ their sense of self to make meaning of their experiences. The self-authorship process emerged as a complex, non-linear and consistent feature of career decision-making. Theoretical contributions include a non-linear view of self-authorship that exposes the authorship of visible and covert multiple selves prompted by both proactive and reactive identity work

Demographic History of Indigenous Populations in Mesoamerica Based on mtDNA Sequence Data

The genetic characterization of Native American groups provides insights into their history and demographic events. We sequenced the mitochondrial D-loop region (control region) of 520 samples from eight Mexican indigenous groups. In addition to an analysis of the genetic diversity, structure and genetic relationship between 28 Native American populations, we applied Bayesian skyline methodology for a deeper insight into the history of Mesoamerica. AMOVA tests applying cultural, linguistic and geographic criteria were performed. MDS plots showed a central cluster of Oaxaca and Maya populations, whereas those from the North and West were located on the periphery. Demographic reconstruction indicates higher values of the effective number of breeding females (Nef) in Central Mesoamerica during the Preclassic period, whereas this pattern moves toward the Classic period for groups in the North and West. Conversely, Nef minimum values are distributed either in the Lithic period (i.e. founder effects) or in recent periods (i.e. population declines). The Mesomerican regions showed differences in population fluctuation as indicated by the maximum Inter-Generational Rate (IGRmax): i) Center-South from the lithic period until the Preclassic; ii) West from the beginning of the Preclassic period until early Classic; iii) North characterized by a wide range of temporal variation from the Lithic to the Preclassic. Our findings are consistent with the genetic variations observed between central, South and Southeast Mesoamerica and the North-West region that are related to differences in genetic drift, structure, and temporal survival strategies (agriculture versus hunter-gathering, respectively). Interestingly, although the European contact had a major negative demographic impact, we detect a previous decline in Mesoamerica that had begun a few hundred years before

Sustained acceleration of soil carbon decomposition observed in a 6-year warming experiment in a warm-temperate forest in southern Japan

To examine global warming’s effect on soil organic carbon (SOC) decomposition in Asian monsoon forests, we conducted a soil warming experiment with a multichannel automated chamber system in a 55-year-old warm-temperate evergreen broadleaved forest in southern Japan. We established three treatments: control chambers for total soil respiration, trenched chambers for heterotrophic respiration (R(h)), and warmed trenched chambers to examine warming effect on R(h). The soil was warmed with an infrared heater above each chamber to increase soil temperature at 5 cm depth by about 2.5 °C. The warming treatment lasted from January 2009 to the end of 2014. The annual warming effect on R(h) (an increase per °C) ranged from 7.1 to17.8% °C(−1). Although the warming effect varied among the years, it averaged 9.4% °C(−1) over 6 years, which was close to the value of 10.1 to 10.9% °C(−1) that we calculated using the annual temperature–efflux response model of Lloyd and Taylor. The interannual warming effect was positively related to the total precipitation in the summer period, indicating that summer precipitation and the resulting soil moisture level also strongly influenced the soil warming effect in this forest

Soil Functions—An Introduction

It is now widely recognised that soils not only provide food but in addition, they deliver a wide range of ecosystem services to society. The EU Thematic Strategy on Soils (2006) identified seven ‘environmental, economic, social and cultural functions’. In research studies from Ireland, these ecosystem services have been rearranged into the following five main soil functions for agricultural land (1) primary production, (2) water purification and regulation, (3) carbon storage and sequestration, (4) habitat for intrinsic and functional biodiversity and (5) the cycling and provision of nutrients. In addition, soils also provide two ancillary functions, namely: (6) a platform for infrastructure (e.g. roads, buildings) and (7) an outdoor archive of archaeological heritage. In principle, all soils perform each of these functions simultaneously. However, the extent to which each function is delivered depends in the first instance, on land use. For example, the functionality of arable soils is characterised by primary production and nutrient cycling. Second, the functionality of soils depends on soil properties. The dominant soil properties in Atlantic climates relate to soil moisture dynamics, specifically the occurrence of excess soil water. Quantifying soil functions is difficult as each soil function encompasses a set of processes which may be altered through management which could alter the delivery of another function, resulting in potentially a synergy or a trade-off between functions. Therefore, proxy-indicators are used to estimate the extent to which a soil provides the five functions. The functionality of soils worldwide is threatened by unsustainable management practices and in Europe, there are eight main threats to soil functionality