Public Beliefs about Alcohol and Substance Use in Saudi Arabia: A Cross Sectional Study

Abuse of alcohol and other substances became a substantial and escalating health and social problem worldwide as hospitals across the world are inundated with patients suffering from conditions associated with or caused by substance use. A descriptive correlation cross section research design was utilized to conduct this study with the aim to assess the Saudi public beliefs about alcohol and substance use in central region of Saudi Arabia on a  non – probability convenience sample of 316 Saudi adults who were recruited from public areas of highest community assembly points. Data were collected using a two part questionnaire. First part concerned with the participant’s demographic background and sources of information about alcohol and substance use, Second part of the questionnaire included 30 statements translated version of the Addiction Belief Inventory (ABI) Luke, Ribisl, Walton, & Davidson (2002). An official approval to conduct the study was obtained from the ethical committee of the research unit at College of Nursing – Riyadh affiliated to King Saud bin Abdulaziz University for Health Sciences along with an informed written consent was obtained from the participants who agreed to participate in the study. Participants who gave consent to participate in the study were individually interviewed and data were collected over a two month period. Data were coded for entry and analyzed using Statistical Package of Social Studies (SPSS) version 18.0. 22 (7%) of the participants had tried alcohol or any other substance at least once in their life. Nineteen participants (6%) had an addicted family member while 71 (22.5%) knew somebody who has addiction problem. Sources of information about addiction varied among the study participants with the internet as a source of information ranked first followed by television shows, movies and series, discussion with family and friends, school or university classes, magazines and newspapers and personal experience. Analysis of data revealed only statistically significant difference between male and female participants in relation to personal substance trial or use(X2 = 4.974, p = 0.02). The highly ranked believes among Saudi adults were: Addicted persons are capable of drinking/using substances socially (M = 4.23, SD = 0.870), a recovering addict should rely on other experts for help and guidance (M = 4.23, SD = 0.863), an alcoholic/addict must seek professional help (M = 4.22, SD = 1.015), to be healed addicted persons have to stop using all substances (M = 4.03, SD = 1.111), relapse is a personal failure (M = 4.03, SD = 1.121). Developing and implementing culturally sensitive public awareness campaigns about the hazards of alcohol and other substance use and the services available to help persons with such problems within the Saudi community in public areas of highest community assembling and throughout all media channels including TV, radio, internet, SMS messages is highly recommended Keywords: alcohol, substance use, beliefs, Saudi publi

The evolving SARS-CoV-2 epidemic in Africa: Insights from rapidly expanding genomic surveillance

INTRODUCTION Investment in Africa over the past year with regard to severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) sequencing has led to a massive increase in the number of sequences, which, to date, exceeds 100,000 sequences generated to track the pandemic on the continent. These sequences have profoundly affected how public health officials in Africa have navigated the COVID-19 pandemic. RATIONALE We demonstrate how the first 100,000 SARS-CoV-2 sequences from Africa have helped monitor the epidemic on the continent, how genomic surveillance expanded over the course of the pandemic, and how we adapted our sequencing methods to deal with an evolving virus. Finally, we also examine how viral lineages have spread across the continent in a phylogeographic framework to gain insights into the underlying temporal and spatial transmission dynamics for several variants of concern (VOCs). RESULTS Our results indicate that the number of countries in Africa that can sequence the virus within their own borders is growing and that this is coupled with a shorter turnaround time from the time of sampling to sequence submission. Ongoing evolution necessitated the continual updating of primer sets, and, as a result, eight primer sets were designed in tandem with viral evolution and used to ensure effective sequencing of the virus. The pandemic unfolded through multiple waves of infection that were each driven by distinct genetic lineages, with B.1-like ancestral strains associated with the first pandemic wave of infections in 2020. Successive waves on the continent were fueled by different VOCs, with Alpha and Beta cocirculating in distinct spatial patterns during the second wave and Delta and Omicron affecting the whole continent during the third and fourth waves, respectively. Phylogeographic reconstruction points toward distinct differences in viral importation and exportation patterns associated with the Alpha, Beta, Delta, and Omicron variants and subvariants, when considering both Africa versus the rest of the world and viral dissemination within the continent. Our epidemiological and phylogenetic inferences therefore underscore the heterogeneous nature of the pandemic on the continent and highlight key insights and challenges, for instance, recognizing the limitations of low testing proportions. We also highlight the early warning capacity that genomic surveillance in Africa has had for the rest of the world with the detection of new lineages and variants, the most recent being the characterization of various Omicron subvariants. CONCLUSION Sustained investment for diagnostics and genomic surveillance in Africa is needed as the virus continues to evolve. This is important not only to help combat SARS-CoV-2 on the continent but also because it can be used as a platform to help address the many emerging and reemerging infectious disease threats in Africa. In particular, capacity building for local sequencing within countries or within the continent should be prioritized because this is generally associated with shorter turnaround times, providing the most benefit to local public health authorities tasked with pandemic response and mitigation and allowing for the fastest reaction to localized outbreaks. These investments are crucial for pandemic preparedness and response and will serve the health of the continent well into the 21st century

Some new results on the face index of certain polycyclic chemical networks

Silicate minerals make up the majority of the earth's crust and account for almost 92 percent of the total. Silicate sheets, often known as silicate networks, are characterised as definite connectivity parallel designs. A key idea in studying different generalised classes of graphs in terms of planarity is the face of the graph. It plays a significant role in the embedding of graphs as well. Face index is a recently created parameter that is based on the data from a graph's faces. The current draft is utilizing a newly established face index, to study different silicate networks. It consists of a generalized chain of silicate, silicate sheet, silicate network, carbon sheet, polyhedron generalized sheet, and also triangular honeycomb network. This study will help to understand the structural properties of chemical networks because the face index is more generalized than vertex degree based topological descriptors

Idealist, Realist or Neo-Realist Financial Aid Donors to Pakistan

Foreign aid has always been an important source of finance for Pakistan. The flow of foreign aid depends upon the donor's interest and motives that can differ as some may be truly interested in helping the recipient nation (Mumtaz, 2013). Some donors may have a national interest while others may want to enhance their economic relations which refer to the idealist, realist, and neo-realist theories of motivations respectively (Berthelemy, 2005). The present inquiry is informed by a qualitative interpretive approach based on semi-structured interviews regarding financial aid donor's motives. The overall results revealed people's perception that America has an inclination for both Pakistan's nation and region for its own benefits whereas the United Kingdom is interested in human resources. Saudi Arab and China have dual motives, one is the development of Pakistan and the other is security and trade interest respectively. So America is proclaimed as realist donors, United Kingdom as Neo-realist while Saudi Arab and China have mixed motivations. Both are Idealists with some realist and neo-realist motivation correspondingly. However other financial aid donors are not prominent amongst the Pakistani nations