REGIONALY IMPORTANT SINCRO.GRID SMART GRID PROJECT

Regional transmission and distribution challenges has evolved and changed a lot in recent years. Four contradictory influences increasingly affected the operations of Slovenian and Croatian electricity systems. Regional electricity systems experienced increasing support of RES integration to meet the EU targets, a lower electricity consumption due to the economic crisis, a growing lack of centralized electricity production for electric system support and the high interconnectivity between the neighboring control zones. TSOs and DSOs observed growing network overvoltage issues as well as a decrease in secondary reserve capacities. Such situation starts to impact national and regional renewable integration targets affecting the security of supply at European level. SINCRO.GRID joint investment project addressed the above-mentioned issues in a sustainable manner. Such cross-border systemic approach will bring synergetic benefits. It will enable an acceptable level of security of operation for at least the next ten years hosting levels of RES in line with the trends foreseen to reach the 2030 targets safely. The project is going to integrate new active elements in the transmission and distribution grids. It leans on the following main pillars: deployment of six compensation devices, deployment of advanced dynamic thermal rating (DTR) systems, deployment of electricity storage systems, integration of distributed renewable generation (DG) and deployment of a virtual cross-border control center (VCBCC). A key aspect of the SINCRO.GRID project lies in the synergy brought by the simultaneous innovative deployment of a portfolio of mature technology-based solutions bring high benefits and positive externalities for the region and European Union

Dose-dependent effectiveness of acellular pertussis vaccine in infants: A population-based case-control study

Background Pertussis is a vaccine-preventable disease which is most severe in young infants. More than two decades after the introduction of acelluar pertussis vaccines (aPV) in national immunization programs in many countries worldwide, a resurgence of pertussis has been recognized. Suboptimal effectiveness of aPV has been blamed as one major reason but only few studies have evaluated dose-dependent vaccine effectiveness (VE) provided by aPV in current practice. Methods We performed a population-based retrospective case-control study by comparing pertussis immunization data of children 2.5 months to 2 years of age hospitalized for pertussis and residing in Switzerland with immunization data of a random control sample of children aged 2 years and residing in Switzerland. VE was defined as the percentage of hospitalizations avoided by number of aPV doses. It was calculated as 1-infection rate ratio (IRR)*100. IRR was calculated by dividing infection rates of vaccinated children and infection rates of unvaccinated children. To get dose specific VE, infection rates were stratified by number doses received. Results VE against hospitalization due to pertussis increased significantly with each consecutive aPV dose in a “3 + 1” primary course in infants: 42.1% (95% CI: 11.3–62.6), 83.9% (70.2–92.1), 98.2% (96.1–99.3), and 100% (97.9–100) after the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th dose, respectively. Conclusion Acellular pertussis vaccines continue to demonstrate protection against hospitalization due to pertussis in infants and young children. Therefore, together with advancing immunization of pregnant women and household contacts, better control of severe pertussis in young infants can be achieved by timely initiation of immunization