scholarly journals Modelling the geographical spread of HIV among MSM in Guangdong, China: a metapopulation model considering the impact of pre-exposure prophylaxis

Author(s):  
Fengshi Jing ◽  
Yang Ye ◽  
Yi Zhou ◽  
Hanchu Zhou ◽  
Zhongzhi Xu ◽  
...  

Men who have sex with men (MSM) make up the majority of new human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) diagnoses among young people in China. Understanding HIV transmission dynamics among the MSM population is, therefore, crucial for the control and prevention of HIV infections, especially for some newly reported genotypes of HIV. This study presents a metapopulation model considering the impact of pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) to investigate the geographical spread of a hypothetically new genotype of HIV among MSM in Guangdong, China. We use multiple data sources to construct this model to characterize the behavioural dynamics underlying the spread of HIV within and between 21 prefecture-level cities (i.e. Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Foshan, etc.) in Guangdong province: the online social network via a gay social networking app, the offline human mobility network via the Baidu mobility website, and self-reported sexual behaviours among MSM. Results show that PrEP initiation exponentially delays the occurrence of the virus for the rest of the cities transmitted from the initial outbreak city; hubs on the movement network, such as Guangzhou, Shenzhen, and Foshan are at a higher risk of ‘earliest’ exposure to the new HIV genotype; most cities acquire the virus directly from the initial outbreak city while others acquire the virus from cities that are not initial outbreak locations and have relatively high betweenness centralities, such as Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Shantou. This study provides insights in predicting the geographical spread of a new genotype of HIV among an MSM population from different regions and assessing the importance of prefecture-level cities in the control and prevention of HIV in Guangdong province. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Data science approach to infectious disease surveillance’.

2015 ◽  
Vol 18 (suppl 1) ◽  
pp. 143-155 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andréa Fachel Leal ◽  
Daniela Riva Knauth ◽  
Márcia Thereza Couto

ABSTRACTHeterosexual men have been a forgotten group for HIV/AIDS interventions and research. Our goal was to identify the different elements that interfere in the prevention of HIV/AIDS among heterosexual men, covering both traditional methods of prevention (especially safe sex practices and testing) and new strategies for prevention (pre- and post-sexual exposure prophylaxis, prevention treatment, and circumcision) in this population. This exploratory article consists of a nonsystematic review of the literature. We discuss the invisibility of heterosexual men in policies, in programs, and in health services. The several interventions analyzed are still poorly monitored and evaluated, so there is a lack of consistent evidence regarding the impact of prevention strategies in this population. Different masculinities, including hegemonic conceptions of masculinity, must be the foundation for interventions targeting men. Men must not be seen merely as a "bridge" in the spread of the HIV/AIDS epidemic, but also as victims of gender patterns that make them vulnerable.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Helena S. Wisniewski

With companies now recognizing how artificial intelligence (AI), digitalization, the internet of things (IoT), and data science affect value creation and the maintenance of a competitive advantage, their demand for talented individuals with both management skills and a strong understanding of technology will grow dramatically. There is a need to prepare and train our current and future decision makers and leaders to have an understanding of AI and data science, the significant impact these technologies are having on business, how to develop AI strategies, and the impact all of this will have on their employees’ roles. This paper discusses how business schools can fulfill this need by incorporating AI into their business curricula, not only as stand-alone courses but also integrated into traditional business sequences, and establishing interdisciplinary efforts and collaborative industry partnerships. This article describes how the College of Business and Public Policy (CBPP) at the University of Alaska Anchorage is implementing multiple approaches to meet these needs and prepare future leaders and decision makers. These approaches include a detailed description of CBPP’s first AI course and related student successes, the integration of AI into additional business courses such as entrepreneurship and GSCM, and the creation of an AI and Data Science Lab in partnership with the College of Engineering and an investment firm.


2017 ◽  
Vol 4 (suppl_1) ◽  
pp. S439-S439
Author(s):  
Eric Ellorin ◽  
Jill Blumenthal ◽  
Sonia Jain ◽  
Xiaoying Sun ◽  
Katya Corado ◽  
...  

Abstract Background “PrEP whore” has been used both as a pejorative by PrEP opponents in the gay community and, reactively, by PrEP advocates as a method to reclaim the label from stigmatization and “slut-shaming.” The actual prevalence and impact of such PrEP-directed stigma on adherence have been insufficiently studied. Methods CCTG 595 was a randomized controlled PrEP demonstration project in 398 HIV-uninfected MSM and transwomen. Intracellular tenofovir-diphosphate (TFV-DP) levels at weeks 12 and 48 were used as a continuous measure of adherence. At study visits, participants were asked to describe how they perceived others’ reactions to them being on PrEP. These perceptions were categorized a priori as either “positively framed,” “negatively framed,” or both. We used Wilcoxon rank-sum to determine the association between positive and negative framing and TFV-DP levels at weeks 12 and 48. Results By week 4, 29% of participants reported perceiving positive reactions from members of their social groups, 5% negative, and 6% both. Reporting decreased over 48 weeks, but positive reactions were consistently reported more than negative. At week 12, no differences in mean TFV-DP levels were observed in participants with positively-framed reactions compared with those reporting no outcome or only negatively-framed (1338 [IQR, 1036-1609] vs. 1281 [946-1489] fmol/punch, P = 0.17). Additionally, no differences were observed in those with negative reactions vs. those without (1209 [977–1427] vs. 1303 [964–1545], P = 0.58). At week 48, mean TFV-DP levels trended toward being higher among those that report any reaction, regardless if positive (1335 [909–1665] vs. 1179 [841–1455], P = 0.09) or negative (1377 [1054–1603] vs. 1192 [838–1486], P = 0.10) than those reporting no reaction. At week 48, 46% of participants reported experiencing some form of PrEP-directed judgment, 23% reported being called “PrEP whore,” and 21% avoiding disclosing PrEP use. Conclusion Over 48 weeks, nearly half of participants reported some form of judgment or stigmatization as a consequence of PrEP use. However, individuals more frequently perceived positively framed reactions to being on PrEP than negative. Importantly, long-term PrEP adherence does not appear to suffer as a result of negative PrEP framing. Disclosures All authors: No reported disclosures.


2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Lauren Alexis De Crescenzo ◽  
Barbara Alison Gabella ◽  
Jewell Johnson

Abstract Background The transition in 2015 to the Tenth Revision of the International Classification of Disease, Clinical Modification (ICD-10-CM) in the US led the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to propose a surveillance definition of traumatic brain injury (TBI) utilizing ICD-10-CM codes. The CDC’s proposed surveillance definition excludes “unspecified injury of the head,” previously included in the ICD-9-CM TBI surveillance definition. The study purpose was to evaluate the impact of the TBI surveillance definition change on monthly rates of TBI-related emergency department (ED) visits in Colorado from 2012 to 2017. Results The monthly rate of TBI-related ED visits was 55.6 visits per 100,000 persons in January 2012. This rate in the transition month to ICD-10-CM (October 2015) decreased by 41 visits per 100,000 persons (p-value < 0.0001), compared to September 2015, and remained low through December 2017, due to the exclusion of “unspecified injury of head” (ICD-10-CM code S09.90) in the proposed TBI definition. The average increase in the rate was 0.33 visits per month (p < 0.01) prior to October 2015, and 0.04 visits after. When S09.90 was included in the model, the monthly TBI rate in Colorado remained smooth from ICD-9-CM to ICD-10-CM and the transition was no longer significant (p = 0.97). Conclusion The reduction in the monthly TBI-related ED visit rate resulted from the CDC TBI surveillance definition excluding unspecified head injury, not necessarily the coding transition itself. Public health practitioners should be aware that the definition change could lead to a drastic reduction in the magnitude and trend of TBI-related ED visits, which could affect decisions regarding the allocation of TBI resources. This study highlights a challenge in creating a standardized set of TBI ICD-10-CM codes for public health surveillance that provides comparable yet clinically relevant estimates that span the ICD transition.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (7) ◽  
pp. 3110
Author(s):  
Karina Gibert ◽  
Xavier Angerri

In this paper, the results of the project INSESS-COVID19 are presented, as part of a special call owing to help in the COVID19 crisis in Catalonia. The technological infrastructure and methodology developed in this project allows the quick screening of a territory for a quick a reliable diagnosis in front of an unexpected situation by providing relevant decisional information to support informed decision-making and strategy and policy design. One of the challenges of the project was to extract valuable information from direct participatory processes where specific target profiles of citizens are consulted and to distribute the participation along the whole territory. Having a lot of variables with a moderate number of citizens involved (in this case about 1000) implies the risk of violating statistical secrecy when multivariate relationships are analyzed, thus putting in risk the anonymity of the participants as well as their safety when vulnerable populations are involved, as is the case of INSESS-COVID19. In this paper, the entire data-driven methodology developed in the project is presented and the dealing of the small subgroups of population for statistical secrecy preserving described. The methodology is reusable with any other underlying questionnaire as the data science and reporting parts are totally automatized.


2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (7) ◽  
pp. 1852 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zachary Dockstader ◽  
Chris Bauch ◽  
Madhur Anand

Over-exploitation of natural resources can have profound effects on both ecosystems and their resident human populations. Simple theoretical models of the dynamics of a population of human harvesters and the abundance of a natural resource being harvested have been studied previously, but relatively few models consider the effect of metapopulation structure (i.e., a population distributed across discrete patches). Here we analyze a socio-ecological metapopulation model based on an existing single-population model used to study persistence and collapse in human populations. Resources grow logistically on each patch. Each population harvests resources on its own patch to support population growth, but can also harvest resources from other patches when their own patch resources become scarce. We show that when populations are allowed to harvest resources from other patches, the peak population size is higher, but subsequent population collapse is significantly accelerated and across a broader parameter regime. As the number of patches in the metapopulation increases, collapse is more sudden, more severe, and occurs sooner. These effects persist under scenarios of asymmetry and inequality between patches. Our model makes simplifying assumptions in order to facilitate insight and understanding of model dynamics. However, the robustness of the model prediction suggests that more sophisticated models should be developed to ascertain the impact of metapopulation structure on socio-ecological sustainability.


2004 ◽  
Vol 48 (9) ◽  
pp. 3491-3497 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mathias W. R. Pletz ◽  
Lesley McGee ◽  
James Jorgensen ◽  
Bernard Beall ◽  
Richard R. Facklam ◽  
...  

ABSTRACT The emergence of fluoroquinolone resistance in sterile-site isolates of Streptococcus pneumoniae is documented in this study characterizing all invasive levofloxacin-resistant (MIC, ≥8 mg/liter) S. pneumoniae isolates (n = 50) obtained from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Active Bacterial Core Surveillance from 1998 to 2002. Resistance among all isolates increased from 0.1% in 1998 to 0.6% in 2001 (P = 0.008) but decreased to 0.4% in 2002, while resistance among vaccine serotypes continued to increase from 0.3% in 1998 to 1.0% in 2002, suggesting that fluoroquinolones continue to exert selective pressure on these vaccine serotypes. Only 22% of resistant isolates were not covered by the conjugate vaccine serogroups. Multilocus sequence typing revealed that 58% of resistant strains were related to five international clones identified by the Pneumococcal Molecular Epidemiology Network, with the Spain23F-1 clone being most frequent (16% of all isolates). Thirty-six percent of the isolates were coresistant to penicillin, 44% were coresistant to macrolides, and 28% were multiresistant to penicillin, macrolides, and fluoroquinolones. Fifty percent of the isolates were resistant to any three drug classes. Ninety-four percent of the isolates had multiple mutations in the quinolone resistance-determining regions of the gyrA, gyrB, parC, and parE genes. In 16% of the isolates, there was evidence of an active efflux mechanism. An unusual isolate was found that showed only a single parE mutation and for which the ciprofloxacin MIC was lower (2 mg/liter) than that of levofloxacin (8 mg/liter). Our results suggest that invasive pneumococcal isolates resistant to levofloxacin in the United States show considerable evidence of multiple resistance and of clonal spread.


2017 ◽  
Vol 22 (4) ◽  
pp. 1190-1200 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tiara C. Willie ◽  
Jamila K. Stockman ◽  
Nicole M. Overstreet ◽  
Trace S. Kershaw

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ji Ma ◽  
Elise Jing ◽  
Jun Han

Activities of nonprofit organizations do not always align with their missions, a managerial problem termed as “mission drift.” Mission drift is difficult to operationalize and quantify; thus, as a critical issue, only a few conceptual pieces or empirical case studies have explored this topic. This paper develops innovative measures to operationalize “mission alignment” using data science methodology, and examines the impact of revenue sources on mission alignment. By using the cosine similarity of text between a mission statement and program description, four measures of mission alignment are devised: the sum cosine similarity, average cosine similarity, weighted sum cosine similarity, and weighted average cosine similarity. Text analysis indicates that a majority of the programs evidence educational purposes, and for-profit business plays an important role in foundations’ projects and funding. The regression analysis shows that personal donation and service revenue can increase mission alignment,while organizational donation and membership dues decrease mission alignment.


Author(s):  
Chad Petersen ◽  
Kevin A. Johnston

The impact that Facebook and Twitter usage has on the creation and maintenance of university student’s cognitive social capital was investigated on students in the Western Cape province of South Africa. Facebook and Twitter were selected as part of the research context because both are popular online social network systems (SNSs), and few studies were found that investigated the impact that both Facebook and Twitter have on the cognitive social capital of South African university students. Data was collected from a survey questionnaire, which was successfully completed by over 100 students from all 5 universities within the Western Cape. The questionnaire was obtained from a previous study, allowing comparisons to be made. Analysis of the results however, did not show a strong relationship between the intensity of Facebook and Twitter usage, and the various forms of social capital. Facebook usage was found to correlate with student’s satisfaction with university life; which suggests that increasing the intensity of Facebook usage for students experiencing low satisfaction with university life might be beneficial.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document