Measures of Mortality in Coronavirus (COVID-19) Compared With SARS and MERS

In late 2019, a novel coronavirus, now designated severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) was identified as the cause of an outbreak of acute respiratory illness in Wuhan, a city in China. Mortality rate, case fatality rate, and Years of Potential Life Lost can be measured by determining death cases. Much of our information on mortality rates of diseases can be obtained through a regular implementation of care plans that are often developed to screen infectious diseases. In the YLL component, the higher the individuals die at an earlier age, the longer their life is lost. For COVID-19, this component refers to the simple subtraction of age at death due to COVID-19 from the standardized life expectancy for the same age in the same sex. A potential application of health summary indices is to consider the non-fatal consequences of diseases to ensure that they are taken into account in health policy making. Given that COVID-19 has a non-fatal effect on a large number of patients, the estimation of disease burden using the DALYs may be an appropriate index for achieving this goal

Effect of wild rodents control in reduction of zoonotic cutaneous leishmaniasis in Golestan province, north of Iran (2016)

Background and Objective: Leishmaniasis is one of the most important vector-borne diseases which transmitted by sand flies to humans and other animals. This study was conducted to determine the effect of wild rodents control in decreasing zoonotic cutaneous leishmaniasis (ZCL) in Golestan province, north of Iran during 2016. Methods: In this descriptive-analytic study, rodent control operation was conducted using Zinc phosphide 2.5% in May, July and September 2019 in 45 villages of Gonbad Kavous County in Golestan province, north of Iran during 2016. The stages of operation in each of the villages were scored, as we considered 25 score for each stage of destruction of nests (one stage) and baiting in nests (three stages). Also, incidence rate which is reported in each of the villages was extracted. Finally, the relationship between rodenticide scores in each village with the incidence of disease was compared. Results: There were rodent’s active burrows around 45 villages. After the end of rodents control operation, 17 villages got 0-25 scores, 8 villages 26-50, 16 villages 51-75 and 4 villages 76-100. The mean incidence rate in these villages was determined 3466.9±2473.5, 2828±1929.1, 4515.4±3478.4 and 636.3±546.6, respectively. There was a significant relationship between the implementation of  rodents control operation and incidence rate of ZCL, so that in villages with a score of between 76-100, the incidence rate was significantly lower than in the villages with a score of between 51 -75 and 26-50 (P<0.05). Conclusion: Regarding the reduction of the incidence of cutaneous leishmaniasis in villages with high scores in Gonbad-e Kavus County, north of Iran, the implementation of rodents control operation seems to be necessary