The Impact of Population Growth on the Epidemiology and Evolution of Infectious Diseases

Author(s):  
Geoffrey P. Garnett ◽  
James J. C. Lewis
2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (SPL1) ◽  
pp. 1026-1033
Author(s):  
Nivedha Valliammai Mahalingam ◽  
Abilasha R ◽  
Kavitha S

Enormous successes have been obtained against the control of major epidemic diseases, such as SARS, MERS, Ebola, Swine Flu in the past. Dynamic interplay of biological, socio-cultural and ecological factors, together with novel aspects of human-animal interphase, pose additional challenges with respect to the emergence of infectious diseases. The important challenges faced in the control and prevention of emerging and re-emerging infectious diseases range from understanding the impact of factors that are necessary for the emergence, to development of strengthened surveillance systems that can mitigate human suffering and death. The aim of the current study is to assess the awareness of symptomatic differences between viral diseases like COVID-19, SARS, Swine flu and common cold among dental students that support the prevention of emergence or re-emergence. Cross-sectional type of study conducted among the undergraduate students comprising 100 Subjects. A questionnaire comprising 15 questions in total were framed, and responses were collected in Google forms in SPSS Software statistical analysis. The study has concluded that dental students have an awareness of the symptomatic differences between infectious viral disease. The study concluded that the awareness of symptomatic differences between viral diseases like COVID-19, SARS, Swine flu, Common cold is good among the dental students who would pave the way for early diagnosis and avoid spreading of such diseases. A further awareness can be created by regular webinars, seminars and brainstorming sessions among these healthcare professionals.


Author(s):  
Polina Trachuk ◽  
Vagish Hemmige ◽  
Ruth Eisenberg ◽  
Kelsie Cowman ◽  
Victor Chen ◽  
...  

Abstract Objective Infection is a leading cause of admission to intensive care units (ICU), with critically ill patients often receiving empiric broad-spectrum antibiotics. Nevertheless, a dedicated infectious diseases (ID) consultation and stewardship team is not routinely established. An ID-Critical Care Medicine (ID-CCM) pilot program was designed at a 400-bed tertiary care hospital in which an ID attending was assigned to participate in daily rounds with the ICU team, as well as provide ID consultation on select patients. We sought to evaluate the impact of this dedicated ID program on antibiotic utilization and clinical outcomes in patients admitted to the ICU. Method In this single site retrospective study, we analyzed antibiotic utilization and clinical outcomes in patients admitted to an ICU during post-intervention period from January 1, 2017 to December 31, 2017 and compared it to antibiotic utilization in the same ICUs during the pre-intervention period from January 1, 2015 to December 31, 2015. Results Our data showed a statistically significant reduction in usage of most frequently prescribed antibiotics including vancomycin, piperacillin-tazobactam and cefepime during the intervention period. When compared to pre-intervention period there was no difference in-hospital mortality, hospital length of stay and re-admission. Conclusion With this multidisciplinary intervention, we saw a decrease in the use of the most frequently prescribed broad-spectrum antibiotics without a negative impact on clinical outcomes. Our study shows that the implementation of an ID-CCM service is a feasible way to promote antibiotic stewardship in the ICU and can be used as a strategy to reduce unnecessary patient exposure to broad-spectrum agents.


2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Fabian Chiong ◽  
Mohammed S. Wasef ◽  
Kwee Chin Liew ◽  
Raquel Cowan ◽  
Danny Tsai ◽  
...  

Abstract Background Pseudomonas aeruginosa bacteraemia (PAB) is associated with high mortality. The benefits of infectious diseases consultation (IDC) has been demonstrated in Staphylococcal aureus bacteraemia and other complex infections. Impact of IDC in PAB is unclear. This study aimed to evaluate the impact of IDC on the management and outcomes in patients with PAB. Methods This is a retrospective cohort single-centre study from 1 November 2006 to 29 May 2019, in all adult patients admitted with first episode of PAB. Data collected included demographics, clinical management and outcomes for PAB and whether IDC occurred. In addition, 29 Pseudomonas aeruginosa (PA) stored isolates were available for Illumina whole genome sequencing to investigate if pathogen factors contributed to the mortality. Results A total of 128 cases of PAB were identified, 71% received IDC. Patients who received IDC were less likely to receive inappropriate duration of antibiotic therapy (4.4%; vs 67.6%; p < 0.01), more likely to be de-escalated to oral antibiotic in a timely manner (87.9% vs 40.5%; p < 0.01), undergo removal of infected catheter (27.5% vs 13.5%; p = 0.049) and undergo surgical intervention (20.9% vs 5.4%, p = 0.023) for source control. The overall 30-day all-cause mortality rate was 24.2% and was significantly higher in the no IDC group in both unadjusted (56.8% vs 11.0%, odds ratio [OR] = 10.63, p < 0.001) and adjusted analysis (adjusted OR = 7.84; 95% confidence interval, 2.95–20.86). The genotypic analysis did not reveal any PA genetic features associated with increased mortality between IDC versus no IDC groups. Conclusion Patients who received IDC for PAB had lower 30-day mortality, better source control and management was more compliant with guidelines. Further prospective studies are necessary to determine if these results can be validated in other settings.


2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mulatu Liyew Berihun ◽  
Atsushi Tsunekawa ◽  
Nigussie Haregeweyn ◽  
Mitsuru Tsubo ◽  
Ayele Almaw Fenta

Abstract Background Evaluating the impacts of land-use/land-cover (LULC) changes on ecosystem service values (ESVs) is essential for sustainable use and management of ecosystems. In this study, we evaluated the impact of human activity driven LULC changes on ESVs over the period 1982–2016/17 in contrasting agro-ecological environments: Guder (highland), Aba Gerima (midland), and Debatie (lowland) watersheds of the Upper Blue Nile basin, Ethiopia. Results During the study period, the continuous expansion of cultivated land at the expense of natural vegetation (bushland, forest, and grazing land) severely reduced the total ESV by about US$ 58 thousand (35%) in Aba Gerima and US$ 31 thousand (29%) in Debatie watersheds. In contrast, the unprecedented expansion of plantations, mainly through the planting of Acacia decurrens, led, from 2006, to a ESV rebound by about US$ 71 thousand (54%) in Guder watershed, after it had decreased by about US$ 61 thousand (32%) between 1982 and 2006. The reduction in natural forest area was the major contributor to the loss of total ESV in the study watersheds, ranging from US$ 31 thousand (63%) in Debatie to US$ 96.9 thousand (70%) in Guder between 1982 and 2016/17. On an area-specific basis, LULC changes reduced the average ESV from US$ 560 ha−1 year−1 (1982) in Guder to US$ 306 ha−1 year−1 (2017) in Debatie watersheds. Specific ESVs such as provisioning (mainly as food production) and regulating services (mainly as erosion control and climate regulation) accounted for most of the total ESVs estimated for the study watersheds. Conclusions In most cases, the total and specific ESVs of the watersheds were negatively associated with the population growth, which in turn was positively associated with the expansion of cultivated land over the study period. In Guder, however, ESVs were positively associated with population growth, especially after 2012. This is mainly due to the expansion of Acacia decurrens plantations. Our results suggest, therefore, that future policy measures and directions should focus on improving vegetation cover through planting multipurpose trees such as Acacia decurrens to prevent future loss of ESV in the midland and lowland regions of the Upper Blue Nile basin and beyond. However, caution must be taken during plantation of invasive species as they may have undesirable consequences.


Author(s):  
Zinabu Wolde ◽  
Wu Wei ◽  
Haile Ketema ◽  
Eshetu Yirsaw ◽  
Habtamu Temesegn

In Ethiopia, land, water, energy and food (LWEF) nexus resources are under pressure due to population growth, urbanization and unplanned consumption. The effect of this pressure has been a widely discussed topic in nexus resource literature. The evidence shows the predominantly negative impact of this; however, the impact of these factors is less explored from a local scale. As a result, securing nexus resources is becoming a serious challenge for the country. This necessitates the identification of the driving factors for the sustainable utilization of scarce LWEF nexus resources. Our study provides a systemic look at the driving factor indicators that induce nexus resource degradation. We use the Analytical Hierarchical Process (AHP) to develop the indicators’ weights, and use a Path Analysis Model (PAM) to quantitatively estimate the effect of the driving factor indicators on the LWEF nexus resources. The results indicate that social (48%), economic (19%), and policy and institutional changes (14%) are the major nexus resource driving factor indicators. The path analysis results indicate that among the social driving factor indicators, population growth and consumption patterns have a significant direct effect on the LWEF nexus, with path coefficients of 0.15 and 0.089, respectively. Similarly, the potential of LWEF nexus resources is also influenced by the institutional and policy change drivers, such as outdated legislation and poor institutional structure, with path coefficients of 0.46 and 0.39, respectively. This implies that population growth and consumption patterns are the leading social drivers, while outdated legislation and poor institutional structures are the institutional and policies change drivers which have a potential impact on LWEF nexus resource degradation. Similarly, other driving factors such as environmental, economic and technological factors also affect nexus resources to varying degrees. The findings of our study show the benefits of managing the identified driving factors for the protection of LWEF nexus resources, which have close links with human health and the environment. In order to alleviate the adverse effects of driving factors, all stakeholders need to show permanent individual and collective commitment. Furthermore, we underline the necessity of applying LWEF nexus approaches to the management of these drivers, and to optimize the environmental and social outcomes.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (11) ◽  
pp. 5114
Author(s):  
Hyung-Chul Rah ◽  
Hyeon-Woong Kim ◽  
Aziz Nasridinov ◽  
Wan-Sup Cho ◽  
Seo-Hwa Choi ◽  
...  

In this paper we demonstrate the threshold effects of infectious diseases on livestock prices. Daily retail prices of pork and chicken were used as structured data; news and SNS mentions of African Swine Fever (ASF) and Avian Influenza (AI) were used as unstructured data. Models were tested for the threshold effects of disease-related news and SNS frequencies, specifically those related to ASF and AI, on the retail prices of pork and chicken, respectively. The effects were found to exist, and the values of ASF-related news on pork prices were estimated to be −9 and 8, indicating that the threshold autoregressive (TAR) model can be divided into three regimes. The coefficients of the ASF-related SNS frequencies on pork prices were 1.1666, 0.2663 and −0.1035 for regimes 1, 2 and 3, respectively, suggesting that pork prices increased by 1.1666 Korean won in regime 1 when ASF-related SNS frequencies increased. To promote pork consumption by SNS posts, the required SNS frequencies were estimated to have impacts as great as one standard deviation in the pork price. These values were 247.057, 1309.158 and 2817.266 for regimes 1, 2 and 3, respectively. The impact response periods for pork prices were estimated to last 48, 6, and 8 days for regimes 1, 2 and 3, respectively. When the prediction accuracies of the TAR and autoregressive (AR) models with regard to pork prices were compared for the root mean square error, the prediction accuracy of the TAR model was found to be slightly better than that of the AR. When the threshold effect of AI-related news on chicken prices was tested, a linear relationship appeared without a threshold effect. These findings suggest that when infectious diseases such as ASF occur for the first time, the impact on livestock prices is significant, as indicated by the threshold effect and the long impact response period. Our findings also suggest that the impact on livestock prices is not remarkable when infectious diseases occur multiple times, as in the case of AI. To date, this study is the first to suggest the use of SNS to promote meat consumption.


Pathogens ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 72
Author(s):  
Lawrence S. Young

The impact of infectious diseases on human life is incalculable [...]


Author(s):  
Lyudmila Kaspruk

Taking into consideration the forecasts that infectious diseases will pose a significant risk of increasing mortality, as well as shortening life expectancy in the next period of time, an assessment of the impact of infectious diseases on demography in the historical and medical aspect allows us to confirm the existence of uniform combinations in creating a counter-strategy for improving health care. There is no doubt about the historical priority of preventive measures. In this sense, the scoring of infections according to the rating of ''demographic tension'' fully admits the possibility of identifying a vector for improving the work on combating infectious diseases.


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