Exchange Rate and Agricultural Trade: Evidence from Iran

Iran has been consistently running a trade deficit in agricultural products. Conditional upon domestic and global output as well as oil exports, we find that the effective real exchange rate plays a significant role in perpetuating this deficit. While we find no evidence of any J-curve dynamics, our results suggest that the effects from currency appreciation is of greater importance when compared to depreciation.YesThis article was originally published in Vol. 43 No. 1 of Economics Bulletin

Effect of Hypnosis in Adolescents: A Narrative Review

Background: More than half of reproductive-age women experience dysmenorrhea, which can reduce their quality of life. The treatment options for dysmenorrhea are medications and alternative therapies. The tendency to use alternative therapies, such as hypnotherapy has increased.Objectives: This study aimed to carry out a narrative review to evaluate the effect of hypnosis on dysmenorrhea in adolescents. Methods: EMBASE, Web of Science, Scopus, Google Scholar, PubMed, Cochrane library ProQuest and clinicaltrials.gov were searched up to 2021 using the following keywords "dysmenorrhea", "hypnosis". The quality of studies was assessed by Cochrane collaboration's tool and the risk of bias in the non-randomized studies of interventions (ROBINS-I) tool.Results: Nine studies with a sample size of 5203 participants were included. The hypnosis intervention similar to drug therapy was effective in reducing the intensity of dysmenorrhea and improving the women's quality of life. Dysmenorrhea pain scores in hypnosis and drug therapy groups were significantly lower than those at baseline, but pain scores in the drug therapy group were significantly lower than in the hypnosis group.Conclusions: Hypnosis can provide lasting pain relief compared to NSAIDs. Therefore, it is recommended that hypnosis as a complementary or alternative therapy reduce the intensity of dysmenorrhea in adolescents

Electromagnetic fields exposure on fetal and childhood abnormalities: Systematic review and meta-analysis

Today, in the modern world, people are often exposed to electromagnetic waves, which can have undesirable effects on cell components that lead to differentiation and abnormalities in cell proliferation, deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) damage, chromosomal abnormalities, cancers, and birth defects. This study aimed to investigate the effect of electromagnetic waves on fetal and childhood abnormalities. PubMed, Scopus, Web of Science, ProQuest, Cochrane Library, and Google Scholar were searched on 1 January 2023. The Cochran's Q-test and I (2) statistics were applied to assess heterogeneity, a random-effects model was used to estimate the pooled odds ratio (OR), standardized mean difference (SMD), and mean difference for different outcomes, and a meta-regression method was utilized to investigate the factors affecting heterogeneity between studies. A total of 14 studies were included in the analysis, and the outcomes investigated were: change in gene expression, oxidant parameters, antioxidant parameters, and DNA damage parameters in the umbilical cord blood of the fetus and fetal developmental disorders, cancers, and childhood development disorders. Totally, the events of fetal and childhood abnormalities were more common in parents who have been exposed to EMFs compared to those who have not (SMD and 95 confidence interval CI, 0.25 0.15-0.35; I (2), 91%). Moreover, fetal developmental disorders (OR, 1.34; CI, 1.17-1.52; I (2), 0%); cancer (OR, 1.14; CI, 1.05-1.23; I (2), 60.1%); childhood development disorders (OR, 2.10; CI, 1.00-3.21; I (2), 0%); changes in gene expression (mean difference MD, 1.02; CI, 0.67-1.37; I (2), 93%); oxidant parameters (MD, 0.94; CI, 0.70-1.18; I (2), 61.3%); and DNA damage parameters (MD, 1.01; CI, 0.17-1.86; I (2), 91.6%) in parents who have been exposed to EMFs were more than those in parents who have not. According to meta-regression, publication year has a significant effect on heterogeneity (coefficient: 0.033; 0.009-0.057). Maternal exposure to electromagnetic fields, especially in the first trimester of pregnancy, due to the high level of stem cells and their high sensitivity to this radiation, the biochemical parameters of the umbilical cord blood examined was shown increased oxidative stress reactions, changes in protein gene expression, DNA damage, and increased embryonic abnormalities. In addition, parental exposure to ionizing and non-ionizing radiation can lead to the enhancement of different cell-based cancers and developmental disorders such as speech problems in childhood

Obstetrics and neonatal outcomes in pregnant women with covid-19: A systematic review

Background: Considering that the obstetricians and pediatricians need to comprehensive information about the obstetric and neonatal effect of COVID-19, this review study was conducted to investigate the impact of COVID-19 on obstetrics and neonatal outcomes. Methods: In this systematic review the international search databases following PubMed, Web of Science, Scopus, ProQuest and Embase and Google scholar were searched. All articles were reviewed by two independent research-ers until 10 April 2020. After quality assessment of included studies the finding reported in 2 sections obstetrics and neonatal outcomes. Results: The sixteen studies with a sample size of 123 pregnant women with a definitive diagnosis of COVID-19 and their neonates were evaluated. The range of gestational age was 25-40 weeks. There was no death associated with COVID-19 in pregnant women. The obstetric outcomes in pregnant women with COVID-19 include de-creased fetal movement, intrauterine fetal distress, anemia, PROM, preterm labor, Multiple Organ Dysfunction Syndrome (MODS) and etc. The most common delivery mode in women affect with COVID-19 was cesarean sec-tion. Expect for one case with MODS, in the majority of the studies reviewed, no severe morbidity or mortality occurred. The neonatal outcomes were stillbirth, prematurity, asphyxia, fetal distress, low birth weight, small for gestational age, large for gestational age, multiple organ dysfunction syndrome, disseminated intravascular coagula-tion and neonatal death. In addition, five neonates born to mothers with COVID-19 were positive for SARS-CoV-2. However, the studies report these outcomes but the exact causes of theme are not known. Conclusion: In this systematic review, we summarize the diverse results of studies about the obstetrics and neonatal outcomes following COVID-19. This infection may cause negative outcomes in both mothers and neonates. However, there were evidence about neonate infected with COVID-19, but there is controversial information about the vertical transmission of COVID-19. © 2020, Iranian Journal of Public Health. All rights reserved