Impacts of flood on health: epidemiologic evidence from Hanoi, Vietnam

Vietnam is one of the most disaster-prone countries in the world. The country suffers from many kinds of natural disasters, of which the most common and serious one is flooding. Long and heavy rainfall during the last days of October and the first week of November 2008 resulted in a devastating flood unseen for over three decades in the capital city of Hanoi. It caused a substantial health impact on residents in and around the city and compromised the capacity of local health services. The aim of this study is to ascertain the vulnerability and health impacts of the devastating flood in Hanoi by identifying the differences in mortality, injuries, and morbidity patterns (dengue, pink eye, dermatitis, psychological problems, and hypertension) between flood affected and non-affected households. A cross-sectional study was carried out involving 871 households in four selected communes (two heavily flood affected and two comparatively less affected) from two severely flooded districts of Hanoi. Participants were interviewed and information collected on the social, economic, and health impacts of the devastation within 1 month after the flood. The self-reported number of deaths and injuries reported in this study within 1 month after the heavy rainfall were a bit higher in severely affected communes as compared to that of the less affected communes of our study. The findings showed higher incidences of dengue fever, pink eye, dermatitis, and psychological problems in communes severely affected by flood as compared to that of the controlled communes. For people in flood prone areas (at risk for flooding), flood prevention and mitigation strategies need to be seriously thought through and acted upon, as these people are exposed to greater health problems such as psychological issues and communicable diseases such as pink eye or dermatitis

Comparison of behaviors regarding live poultry exposure among rural residents in Vietnam and Thailand

Introduction: Live poultry exposure and risk behaviors are more prevalent in rural communities, increasing the risk of influenza A/H5N1 infection. We examined the economic and socio-cultural influences on poultry-related practices by comparing the poultry-related practices among Vietnamese and Thai rural residents by family income and consumption preference. Methods: Stratified cluster sampling was performed to select households. Within each household, one adult was randomly selected for a face-to-face interview in five Vietnamese and five Thai rural districts. Using a standardized questionnaire to assess domestic poultry husbandry, live poultry purchase, and demographics, logistic regression enabled comparisons of behaviors related to live poultry exposure and examination of associated factors. Results: Among 994 Vietnamese and 907 Thai rural residents, live poultry exposure (prevalence of raising poultry, improper handling of sick or dead poultry, touching live poultry before buying, and slaughtering poultry at home) was more prevalent among Vietnamese than Thai respondents. After adjusting for other demographics, respondents with higher family incomes were less likely to rear backyard poultry in both Vietnam and Thailand, and with more likely to buy live poultry in Vietnam, but not in Thailand. Consumption preference for live poultry was associated with being more likely to rear backyard poultry in Vietnam and Thailand, and with being more likely to buy live poultry in Thailand, but not in Vietnam. Conclusion: The findings suggest important roles of economic imperatives and cultural preference for live poultry for consumption in supporting poultry rearing and live poultry purchase among rural residents. © 2014 Liao et al.published_or_final_versio

SOCIAL-EMOTIONAL SKILLS IN STUDENTS’ LEARNING IN CAN THO UNIVERSITY, VIETNAM

Based on an overview of domestic and foreign research related to the research field of the topic; the research of the topic has determined the urgency of the topic, research objectives, research objects and scope, research hypotheses, research tasks, and methods. The research on the topic has systematized the theoretical basis for the concept and manifestation of social-emotional skills in student learning: generalizing the picture of the current situation of recognizing the importance of social-emotional skills in student learning, the level of assessment of the manifestation and educational measures of social-emotional skills in learning, and finding out the factors that affect social emotions in student learning such as from the external environment, at school, family and external social relationships. Factors from the internal environment are the self-awareness of each student. From the current situation of the problem, the study has proposed educational measures for 504 students from 8 schools and colleges in Can Tho University (CTU), Vietnam. Some measures were to educate social-emotional skills for students through soft skills topics, teach soft skills to students through extracurricular activities, and soft skills education for students through integrated teaching.  Article visualizations

Lecturers' adoption to use the online Learning Management System (LMS): Empirical evidence from TAM2 model for Vietnam

Online training has been a common form of training all over the world for many years ago; however, it is only a side choice alongside offline training. Not only students but also lecturers prefer offline training to online training. However, in some cases of force majeure, specifically the nCov-19 flu pandemic, online training is considered the best way to teach. This study is based on the Technology Acceptance Model 2 (TAM2) to learn about the lecturers' adoption of using the learning management system (LMS) at universities in Vietnam. Mixed research methods are used to achieve the research objectives. Online group discussions, as well as online surveys, were conducted to collect data to analyze and test the hypotheses as well as the theoretical model. The results of the study are similar to the conclusions of TAM2. Thereby, the study proposes managerial implications to improve the lecturers' adoption

Assessing damages of agricultural land due to flooding in a lagoon region based on remote sensing and GIS: case study of the Quang Dien district, Thua Thien Hue province, central Vietnam

This study aims to create a flood extent map with Sentinel imagery and to evaluate impacts on agricultural land in the lagoon region of central Vietnam. In this study, remote sensing images, obtained from 2017 to 2019, were used to simultaneously map the land cover status of a flood in the Quang Dien district. This study highlights flooded areas from Sentinel-2 images by calculating some indicators such as the Land Surface Water Index (LSWI) and the Enhanced Vegetation Index (EVI). Comparisons between the floodplain samples (GPS point-based) and flood mapping results, with the ground-truth data, indicate that the overall accuracy and Kappa coefficients were 97.9% and 0.62 respectively for 2017; the values for 2019 were 95.7% and 0.77 for the same coefficients. Land use maps overlying the flood-affected maps show that approximately 11% of the agriculture land area was affected by floods in 2019 comparison to a 10% in 2017. Wet rice was the most affected crop with the flooded area accounting for more than 70% of the district under each flood event. The most affected communes are: Quang An, Quang Phuoc and Quang Thanh. This study provides valuable information for flood disaster planning, mitigation and recovery activities in Vietnam.Mục tiêu của nghiên cứu là lập bản đồ phân bố ngập lụt với hình ảnh vệ tinh Sentinel và đánh giá ảnh hưởng ngập lụt đến sử dụng đất nông nghiệp ở vùng đầm phá miền Trung, Việt Nam. Trong nghiên cứu này, ảnh viễn thám thu nhận giai đoạn 2017-2019 được sử dụng để xây dựng bản đồ hiện trạng sử dụng đất tại thời điểm bị ngập nước trên địa bàn huyện Quảng Điền. Nghiên cứu đã xác định được vùng ngập lụt ở huyện Quảng Điền bằng phương pháp phân loại chỉ số mặt nước (Land Surface Water Index – LSWI) và chỉ số khác biệt thực vật (Enhanced Vegetation Index-EVI) từ ảnh Sentinel-2. Xác định vùng nước lũ bị che khuất bởi mây bằng mô hình số hóa độ cao (DEM). Kết quả phân loại vùng ngập lụt được so sánh với giá trị tham chiếu mặt đất cho thấy độ chính xác tổng thể và hệ số Kappa đạt được trong năm 2017 là 97,9% và 0,62; trong khi năm 2019 đạt 95,7% và 0.77. Bản đồ sử dụng đất chồng lên bản đồ lũ lụt cho thấy khoảng 11% diện tích đất nông nghiệp bị ảnh hưởng bởi lũ lụt năm 2019 so với 10% năm 2017. Cây lúa nước là cây trồng bị ảnh hưởng nặng nề nhất, với diện tích bị ngập lụt chiếm hơn 70% diện tích lúa của huyện. Các xã bị ngập lớn là xã Quảng An, Quảng Phước và Quảng Thành. Nghiên cứu này cung cấp thông tin có giá trị cho các hoạt động lập kế hoạch, giảm nhẹ và phục hồi thiên tai lũ lụt ở Việt Nam

Заболевания щитовидной железы. Диффузный токсический зоб

ЗОБ ДИФФУЗНЫЙ ТОКСИЧЕСКИЙЩИТОВИДНОЙ ЖЕЛЕЗЫ БОЛЕЗН

Antibacterial Nanocomposites Based on Fe 3

For the vulcanized natural rubber (NR), incorporation of silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) into the NR matrix did not exhibit the bactericidal property against Escherichia coli (E. coli). However, incorporation of AgNPs into polyethylene (PE) matrix showed good antibacterial activities to both Gram-negative and Gram-positive bacteria. In the present work, NR/PE (85/15) blends have been prepared by melt blending with presence of compatibilizer in an internal mixer. To possess antibacterial property, AgNPs (5–10 nm) or Fe3O4–Ag hybrid nanoparticles (FAgNPs, 8 nm/16 nm) were added into PE matrix before its blending with NR component. The tensile test indicated that the presence of compatibilizer in NR/PE blend significantly enhanced the tensile strength and elongation at break (up to 35% and 38% increases, resp.). The antibacterial activity test was performed by monitoring of the bacterial lag-log growth phases with the presence of nanocomposites in the E. coli cell culture reactor. The antibacterial test showed that the presence of FAgNPs in NR/PE blend had a better antibacterial activity than that obtained with the lone AgNPs. Two similar reasons were proposed: (i) the faster Ag+ release rate from the Fe3O4–Ag hybrid nanoparticles due to the electron transfer from AgNP to Fe3O4 nanoparticle and (ii) the fact that the ionization of AgNPs in hybrid nanostructure might be accelerated by Fe3+ ions

Microscopic Observation Drug Susceptibility Assay (MODS) for Early Diagnosis of Tuberculosis in Children

MODS is a novel liquid culture based technique that has been shown to be effective and rapid for early diagnosis of tuberculosis (TB). We evaluated the MODS assay for diagnosis of TB in children in Viet Nam. 217 consecutive samples including sputum (n = 132), gastric fluid (n = 50), CSF (n = 32) and pleural fluid (n = 3) collected from 96 children with suspected TB, were tested by smear, MODS and MGIT. When test results were aggregated by patient, the sensitivity and specificity of smear, MGIT and MODS against “clinical diagnosis” (confirmed and probable groups) as the gold standard were 28.2% and 100%, 42.3% and 100%, 39.7% and 94.4%, respectively. The sensitivity of MGIT and MODS was not significantly different in this analysis (P = 0.5), but MGIT was more sensitive than MODS when analysed on the sample level using a marginal model (P = 0.03). The median time to detection of MODS and MGIT were 8 days and 13 days, respectively, and the time to detection was significantly shorter for MODS in samples where both tests were positive (P<0.001). An analysis of time-dependent sensitivity showed that the detection rates were significantly higher for MODS than for MGIT by day 7 or day 14 (P<0.001 and P = 0.04), respectively. MODS is a rapid and sensitive alternative method for the isolation of M.tuberculosis from children