A GIS–Integrated Wireless Sensors Network Tool for Water Risk Monitoring – Case of Khanh Hoa Water Supply and Sewerage Company, Vietnam

This paper investigates the feasibility of deploying a wireless sensor network (WSN) to monitor raw water quality at 2 major water treatment plants (WTPs) sites, operated by the The Khanh Hoa Water Supply and Sewerage Company (KHAWASSCO) in Vietnam: Canh Vo and Xuan Canh on the Cai River. The main aim is to propose a WSN for both WTPs which includes 2 clusters of sensors with 4 nodes each in order to monitor various parameters of water quality. Data management is integrated with a geographical information system (GIS) tool in order to provide a comprehensive spatio-temporal database in real time. This will assist decision makers in improving the management of the raw water quality at Cai River

Spatial Interpolation of Air Pollutants in Bangalore: 2010-2013

Air pollutants and their ill effects on the environment and health of populations are well known. However for informed decisions on the protection of the health of populations from elevated levels of air pollution, an understanding of spatial-temporal variance of air pollutant patterns is necessary. Bangalore and other similar developing cities do not have an adequate number of fixed monitoring stations that could provide a complete coverage of the air pollution levels for the entire city. This can be overcome by using geospatial interpolation techniques that provide a complete coverage of the levels of pollutants. The aim of this study is to locate sample points, characterise distribution patterns, map air pollutant distributions using interpolation techniques, highlight areas exceeding standard levels and in doing so determine spatial and temporal patterns of the levels of air pollutants. An air pollution map indicating levels of the variability of the pollutants will aid in the analysis of effects on health in populations due to elevated levels of pollutants

Air Pollution in Bangalore, India: A Six-Year Trend and Health Implication Analysis

Air pollution is increasingly becoming a global concern and is believed to be amongst the leading causes of death in the world today. Developing countries, with rapidly growing economies, are struggling between the focus on economic development and curbing air pollution emissions. Bangalore is one of India’s fastest growing metropolises and, although benefiting economically due to its rapid development, has a rapidly deteriorating environment. This paper provides a critical analysis of the air pollution trend in the city over the period 2005-2011 at 6 specific locations where measurements have been consistently recorded. It also discusses the potential health implications pertaining to exceeding levels of pollutants where these are applicable

Spatio-Temporal Analysis of the Effects of Air Pollution Hazards on Cardiovascular Health Outcomes in Bangalore, India

Recent research has established a link between exposure to certain pollutants and exacerbation or onset of cardiac diseases. Diseases have a spatial context and the evolution of computer applications, such as Geographical Information Systems (GIS), has favoured the studies of environment and their effects on health and populations. To aid in understanding the extent of air pollution and cardiac diseases in the city of Bangalore (India), this research explores the data requirements and GIS analysis tools that could be used to undertake a spatio-temporal analysis by developing a web based GIS application. The ultimate goal is to identify hotspots of air pollution, explore the relationships between environmental pollution hazards and cardiovascular diseases, integrate the available data to enable sharing among decision makers and disseminate information

PRIMARY EDUCATION IN VIETNAM AND PUPIL ONLINE ENGAGEMENT

This paper focuses on exploring the disparities in social awareness and use of the Internet between urban and rural school children in the North of Vietnam. Design/methodology/approach: A total of 525 pupils, aged 9 to 11 years old, randomly selected from 7 urban and rural schools, who are Internet users, participated in the study and consented to responding to a questionnaire adapted from an equivalent European Union (EU) study. A comparative statistical analysis of the responses was then carried out, using IBM SPSS v21, which consisted of a descriptive analysis, an identification of personal self-development opportunities, as well as issues related to pupils’ digital prowess and knowledge of Internet use, and Internet safety, including parental engagement in their offspring’s online activities. Findings: The study highlights the fact that children from both the urban and rural regions of the North of Vietnam mostly access to the Internet from home, but with more children in the urbanized areas accessing it at school than their rural counterparts. Although children from the rural areas scored lower on all the Internet indicators, such as digital access and online personal experience and awareness, there was no disparity in awareness of Internet risks between the two sub-samples. It is noteworthy that there was no statistically significant gender difference towards online activities that support self-development. In relation to safe Internet usage, children are likely to seek advice from their parents, rather than through teachers or friends. However, they are not yet provided with an effective safety net while exposing themselves to the digital world. Originality/value: Although the Vietnamese national curriculum on the Computer Science subject does not explicitly cover the use of the Internet and its related aspects, the majority of children who took part in this study claimed to have used the Internet in their learning activities. This emphasises the urgent need for the MoE and educators in the country to not only improve ICT facilities in schools, but also to revise the Computer Science curriculum in order to (a) provide a supportive environment for learning development and (b) collectively advocate the dynamics of Internet use in order to ensure safe access and use by the children

Impacts of Parasites in Early Life: Contrasting Effects on Juvenile Growth for Different Family Members

Parasitism experienced early in ontogeny can have a major impact on host growth, development and future fitness, but whether siblings are affected equally by parasitism is poorly understood. In birds, hatching asynchrony induced by hormonal or behavioural mechanisms largely under parental control might predispose young to respond to infection in different ways. Here we show that parasites can have different consequences for offspring depending on their position in the family hierarchy. We experimentally treated European Shag (Phalacrocorax aristoteli) nestlings with the broad-spectrum anti-parasite drug ivermectin and compared their growth rates with nestlings from control broods. Average growth rates measured over the period of linear growth (10 days to 30 days of age) and survival did not differ for nestlings from treated and control broods. However, when considering individuals within broods, parasite treatment reversed the patterns of growth for individual family members: last-hatched nestlings grew significantly slower than their siblings in control nests but grew faster in treated nests. This was at the expense of their earlier-hatched brood-mates, who showed an overall growth rate reduction relative to last-hatched nestlings in treated nests. These results highlight the importance of exploring individual variation in the costs of infection and suggest that parasites could be a key factor modulating within-family dynamics, sibling competition and developmental trajectories from an early age

Profound variation in dihydropyrimidine dehydrogenase activity in human blood cells: major implications for the detection of partly deficient patients

Dihydropyrimidine dehydrogenase (DPD) is responsible for the breakdown of the widely used antineoplastic agent 5-fluorouracil (5FU), thereby limiting the efficacy of the therapy. To identify patients suffering from a complete or partial DPD deficiency, the activity of DPD is usually determined in peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBM cells). In this study, we demonstrated that the highest activity of DPD was found in monocytes followed by that of lymphocytes, granulocytes and platelets, whereas no significant activity of DPD could be detected in erythrocytes. The activity of DPD in PBM cells proved to be intermediate compared with the DPD activity observed in monocytes and lymphocytes. The mean percentage of monocytes in the PBM cells obtained from cancer patients proved to be significantly higher than that observed in PBM cells obtained from healthy volunteers. Moreover, a profound positive correlation was observed between the DPD activity of PBM cells and the percentage of monocytes, thus introducing a large inter- and intrapatient variability in the activity of DPD and hindering the detection of patients with a partial DPD deficiency. © 1999 Cancer Research Campaig

WSES Jerusalem guidelines for diagnosis and treatment of acute appendicitis

Acute appendicitis (AA) is among the most common cause of acute abdominal pain. Diagnosis of AA is challenging; a variable combination of clinical signs and symptoms has been used together with laboratory findings in several scoring systems proposed for suggesting the probability of AA and the possible subsequent management pathway. The role of imaging in the diagnosis of AA is still debated, with variable use of US, CT and MRI in different settings worldwide. Up to date, comprehensive clinical guidelines for diagnosis and management of AA have never been issued. In July 2015, during the 3rd World Congress of the WSES, held in Jerusalem (Israel), a panel of experts including an Organizational Committee and Scientific Committee and Scientific Secretariat, participated to a Consensus Conference where eight panelists presented a number of statements developed for each of the eight main questions about diagnosis and management of AA. The statements were then voted, eventually modified and finally approved by the participants to The Consensus Conference and lately by the board of co-authors. The current paper is reporting the definitive Guidelines Statements on each of the following topics: 1) Diagnostic efficiency of clinical scoring systems, 2) Role of Imaging, 3) Non-operative treatment for uncomplicated appendicitis, 4) Timing of appendectomy and in-hospital delay, 5) Surgical treatment 6) Scoring systems for intra-operative grading of appendicitis and their clinical usefulness 7) Non-surgical treatment for complicated appendicitis: abscess or phlegmon 8) Pre-operative and post-operative antibiotics.Peer reviewe

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