scholarly journals SIR Modeling the Dual Disaster Impacts of Omicron B.1.1.529 and Natural Disaster Events on Simulated 6 Months (December 2021 – May 2022) Healthcare System Resiliences in Fragile SE Asia Ring of Fire Ecosystems

Author(s):  
Andri Wibowo

AbstractFor some countries that have experienced numerous natural disasters, including massive earthquakes and tsunamis, managing the COVID-19 pandemic can be very challenging. This situation arises considering that the disaster can directly and indirectly affect the healthcare system’ s capacity to serve the COVID-19 cases. With severely damaged healthcare facilities due to the disaster, there will be severely ill COVID-19 cases unmanaged. The coupling and interplay between these two phenomena can indeed be catastrophic. One of the regions where this issue becomes concerned is in Southeast Asia, where most of the Asian countries lie in the fragile ring of fire ecosystem, contributing to the high tsunami and earthquake disasters in the world. At the same time, Asia is one of the regions that have been severely impacted due to the current COVID-19 Delta Variant. Recently, a more contagious Omicron Variant has emerged and put a more massive burden on the healthcare facilities that are impacted by disasters. Then, in this situation, this paper aims to assess healthcare resilience in managing the Omicron pandemic amid disaster impacts. SIR simulation was used to determine whether severely ill Omicron cases were below or above healthcare and ICU capacity under different vaccination coverage. Our result confirms that vaccination coverage was the imminent factor in reducing the severely ill cases in every healthcare facility, whether the facilities were damaged or not. Increasing vaccination coverage from 30% to 60% will significantly reduce the number of severely ill cases that fall below the capacity of healthcare. Based on the current SIR model on the Omicron epidemic variables and Ro, it is estimated that the Omicron will reach its peak after 180 days in February 2022 and will totally disappear in May 2022 in this modeled area. When healthcare system facilities were fully operational and no disaster happened, combined with 60% vaccination rates, all Omicron case numbers were below and under the available hospital beds and even available ICU beds. While the situation is changed when a disaster occurs and causes 30% damage or reduction to healthcare facilities. In this situation, there are portions of Omicron cases that cannot be managed by the healthcare system since the cases have exceeded the available beds. The situations become more apparent where the healthcare facilities are severely damaged and lose 60% of their functionality. In this situation, all modeled Omicron cases and even the severe cases have exceeded the ICU capacity.

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-1
Author(s):  
Naveen Kumar

The second wave of Covid -19 in India has made us witness as to how negligence from the part of everyone of us, be it people, Government or policy makers of healthcare system might bring the unwanted disaster in the form of Covid Tsunami. This has made us to see never ending queues of patients , relatives standing for hours for the want of hospital beds, oxygen, essential medicines and lastly but unfortunate for their turn for the cremations of loved ones . But now we can see the number of active cases are declining across the country. Amidst this positive observation in regard of second wave ,there is speculation erupting about the Covid third wave. We can appreciate a similarity in the way that the noble corona virus behave with the Spanish flu that had shaken the world in 1918. It had resulted in three waves with second wave was most deadly and long lasting than the other two waves. During the first wave where the infection was mostly of mild severity we had seen the disease affecting the elderly and immune-compromised patients more. In contrast to this, second wave resulting from mutant strains affected the younger population more and it was of larger severity with high mortality rate. Scientists and experts are now anticipating the third wave , taking the lesson from the Spanish flu and we must be better prepare for it. In order to prepare ourselves from a expected third wave of Covid-19, we shouldn’t repeat mistakes that we made during previos waves. We should refrain ourselves from dismantling our enhanced healthcare facilities, there should not be any sorts of shortage of oxygen , hospital beds, and drug that we have already witnessed. We must have an aggressive containment measure comprising of a really strong and pro-active surveillance system. This can be achieved by increasing the capacity of the existing surveillance system by identifying active cases early. We must ensure that we should follow “social vaccine” of proper masking, avoid indoor gatherings, and proper sanitization. Our vaccination programme needs a boost. We should vaccinate a large section of people before any third wave hits us. The more we vaccinate, the better prepared we are. As medical professionals, it must be ensured that proper scientific protocol must be implemented while handling Covid-19 cases. And last but not the least efforts must be made to fill up vacancies seen in our public health system, especially for frontline healthcare workers. As it is anticipated that the young children are more vulnerable to the forthcoming third wave, efforts are to be sought in order to start vaccination of the younger children in our country. Trials for which has already been started in India and across the world. Till the time vaccine is made available, the resources are to be mobilized to build up healthcare facilities catering the vulnerable age group in this third wave such as building up of more paediatric wards, paediatric ICU’s , training of healthcare personals in handling the emergencies for expected third wave .In addition to these efforts , more and more paediatric covid care centers must be set up at various parts of the country. Equally important is making arrangements for rehabilitation centers for the orphans. Countries like US, Singapore and UAE have already started vaccinating the children in age group between 12 to 15 years with Pfizer-BioNTech Covid vaccine. It’s a high time that the government in India must consider for allowing “expedited approval pathway” to the companies like Pfizer for their Covid-19 vaccine for children. All these combined efforts from everyone may ensure that the country and world may remain well equipped against these subsequent waves of this deadly virus and pave the path of the triumph in the near future.


Author(s):  
Pratibha Wankhede ◽  
Mayur Wanjari ◽  
Sampada Late ◽  
Hina Rodge

Introduction: On March 11, 2020, the WHO formally declared the new coronavirus severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) outbreaks a pandemic by publishing public health guidelines to guide pandemic response. Serious illnesses may necessitate hospitalization and ventilatory assistance. The pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has posed new concerns for healthcare workers around the world. However, in many developing nations, including India, information is scarce concerning these issues. Healthcare facilities are one-of-a-kind and difficult to understand. The Indian healthcare system consists of both governmental and private healthcare facilities. Healthcare practitioners face a variety of obstacles daily. The unexpected appearance of COVID-19 created a new threat to an already overburdened healthcare system. The pandemic altered the healthcare dilemma by introducing new employment and societal obstacles to healthcare workers. The goal of this review research is to uncover the causes of the workplace and societal issues that healthcare workers encounter.


2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (Supplement_1) ◽  
pp. S326-S327
Author(s):  
Irene Riestra Guiance ◽  
Ernesto Robalino Gonzaga ◽  
Isabel Riestra ◽  
Steven Char ◽  
Minh Q Ho

Abstract Background As the COVID-19 pandemic raged throughout the United States, the healthcare system was strained due to a sudden increase in demand. Testing was initially limited, and the perception was that patients with high comorbidity burden were at higher risk for poor outcomes. The Charleston Comorbidity Index (CCI) is widely used as a predictor of prognosis and one-year mortality for a wide range of pathologies. This study aims to assess whether a correlation exists between CCI score, COVID-19 incidence throughout the pandemic and patient outcomes. Charleston Comorbidity Index Score Scoring system for Charleston Comorbidity Index (CCI). Plus 1 point for every decade age 50 years and over, maximum 4 points. Higher scores indicate a more severe condition and consequently, a worse prognosis. Methods Multicenter, retrospective review of patients diagnosed with COVID-19 from January 2020 to September 2020 throughout the HCA Healthcare system. The percent of total encounters that were COVID-19 positive by state was calculated along with the average CCI score for COVID-19 patients in 2-month increments. Patient outcomes were obtained across the entire population. Results A clear surge of infected patients was seen in almost all states in the dataset from May 2020 onward except in Colorado and Louisiana where the percentage of COVID-19 positive encounters decreased until July 2020. As summer 2020 progressed, the highest percentage of COVID-19 positive encounters among HCA Healthcare facilities was in Florida and Texas. However, despite the fact that more patients were COVID-19 positive in these states, the CCI score was the lowest (Figure 1). The highest average CCI throughout the 9-month period was 7.66 in Colorado. In the first two months of the pandemic, patients who tested positive for COVID-19 had higher CCI scores on average than those who became COVID-19 positive later in the pandemic. Missouri had the lowest CCI average but the highest ICU admissions and in-hospital mortality. Indiana had the lowest average CCI score, and lowest admission rate (Figure 2). COVID-19 Encounters and Average CCI score by State from January 2020 to September 2020 Graph 1: Percentage of COVID-19 Encounters in 9 Months at an HCA Healthcare Facility by State: Graph presents data obtained for the total of 92,800 patient encounters from January to September 2020 and recorded in 2-month increments. The rate of positive encounters throughout 18 states increased on average from May to September. From January to March 2020, the facilities with the highest rate of COVID-19 encounters were in Colorado, Louisiana and Texas. The states with the highest increment increase of COVID-19 positive patients were Texas, Florida and South Carolina and were trending up as the pandemic wore on through the summer of 2020. Graph 2: Average Charleston Comorbidity Index of COVID-19 Patient Seen at an HCA Healthcare Facility by State in 9 Months: In winter 2020 (January to March 2020) the average CCI score for patients seen with COVDI-19 was higher than in the Spring and Summer 2020 in all states except in Montana and Kentucky. Summer 2020 (May to July 2020) demonstrated some of the lowest average CCI scores for COVID-19 positive patients seen at an HCA Healthcare Facility. Rate of Positive COVID-19, Patient Outcomes and Average Charleston Comorbidity Index Score by State Graph 3: Outcomes of COVID-19 Positive Patients Seen at an HCA Healthcare Facility: Mortality and ICU admission was the highest in Missouri, however, the state had the least COVID-19 patients admitted. The rate of positive test per encounter was the highest in Florida and Texas. Texas had a higher mortality among admitted COVID-19 patients than Florida, however, Florida had a higher percentage of COVID-19 patients admitted. Graph 4: Average Charleston Comorbidity Index Score of COVID-19 Positive Patients Seen at an HCA Healthcare Facility: Average CCI was the lowest in Missouri. The states with the highest CCI score were Indiana, California, New Hampshire and Nevada. Conclusion We observed an inverse correlation between CCI score and COVID-19 incidence while seeing that, on average, COVID-19 positive patients had higher CCI score in the first few months of the pandemic when incidence rate was lower. CCI score did not correlate to ICU admission, but a higher CCI score correlated to higher admission rate. Disclosures All Authors: No reported disclosures


2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 19-47
Author(s):  
Prashant Verma ◽  
Subhash Datta

The Governments across the world are making continuous efforts to attain health for all. The efforts can gain more efficiency if the new healthcare facilities are created at optimal locations. There are various constraints on healthcare facilities, like cost of setup, coverage distance, service distance, population load, manpower and services offered. These constraints operate in a complex setting giving rise to alternate scenarios. The study proposes replicable heuristics to obtain the optimal locations under alternate scenarios for the Sub Centers (SC), Primary healthcare centers (PHC) and Community healthcare centers (CHC). The study takes the case of a block of villages in most populous state of India using the publicly available data, data from census, government portals and Bing Maps services. The study generates several alternatives scenarios for maximize demand, minimize service distance and minimize total costs for different population covered and service distance. The methodology suggested here might be helpful for the location decision making at the block level by the district administration.


2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (6) ◽  
pp. 9697-9726
Author(s):  
Anichur Rahman ◽  
◽  
Muaz Rahman ◽  
Dipanjali Kundu ◽  
Md Razaul Karim ◽  
...  

<abstract><p>The ever-evolving and contagious nature of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) has immobilized the world around us. As the daily number of infected cases increases, the containment of the spread of this virus is proving to be an overwhelming task. Healthcare facilities around the world are overburdened with an ominous responsibility to combat an ever-worsening scenario. To aid the healthcare system, Internet of Things (IoT) technology provides a better solution—tracing, testing of COVID patients efficiently is gaining rapid pace. This study discusses the role of IoT technology in healthcare during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemics. The study overviews different research, platforms, services, products where IoT is used to combat the COVID-19 pandemic. Further, we intelligently integrate IoT and healthcare for COVID-19 related applications. Again, we focus on a wide range of IoT applications in regards to SARS-CoV-2 tracing, testing, and treatment. Finally, we effectively consider further challenges, issues, and some direction regarding IoT in order to uplift the healthcare system during COVID-19 and future pandemics.</p></abstract>


2011 ◽  
Vol 23 (4) ◽  
pp. 186-191 ◽  
Author(s):  
Malini Ratnasingam ◽  
Lee Ellis

Background. Nearly all of the research on sex differences in mass media utilization has been based on samples from the United States and a few other Western countries. Aim. The present study examines sex differences in mass media utilization in four Asian countries (Japan, Malaysia, South Korea, and Singapore). Methods. College students self-reported the frequency with which they accessed the following five mass media outlets: television dramas, televised news and documentaries, music, newspapers and magazines, and the Internet. Results. Two significant sex differences were found when participants from the four countries were considered as a whole: Women watched television dramas more than did men; and in Japan, female students listened to music more than did their male counterparts. Limitations. A wider array of mass media outlets could have been explored. Conclusions. Findings were largely consistent with results from studies conducted elsewhere in the world, particularly regarding sex differences in television drama viewing. A neurohormonal evolutionary explanation is offered for the basic findings.


2020 ◽  
Vol 01 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ruqia Bibi ◽  
Saima Gul ◽  
Abdul Wahab ◽  
Mohammad Iqbal Khan ◽  
Murad Ali Khan

Background: The incidence of dementia is increasing as the aging population of the world is increasing. Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is the neurodegenerative disorder of the central nervous system. There are presently 7.3 million patents of AD and the number may rise to 34 million at this pace in the coming thirty years. In the disease, the level of Acetylcholine is reduced and as a result, causes the loss of cholinergic neurons in the brain. The disease is less common in Asian countries as compared to the western nations of the world. This work aimed to establish the role of the common medicinal and food plants against Alzheimer. Methods: The enzyme acetylcholinesterase (AChE) is the enzyme responsible for hydrolysis and reduction of Acetylcholine. The anti-acetylcholinesterase activity of different extracts of three local plants used as spices in the daily food, Curcuma longa, Cinnnamomum tamala, and Zingiber officinale, were determined using the Microplate Assay method. Results: The phytochemical study of the selected plants revealed the presence of alkaloids, terpenes, flavones, saponins, and tannins in these plants. The chloroform extract of all the three plants presented promising AChE inhibiting activity having IC50 >200μg/ml. A probable reason will be the alkaloids and terpenes present in the chloroform extract. Conclusion: The chloroform extract of all three plants presented promising AChE inhibiting activity and can become a reasonable therapy for the cure/ prevention of Alzheimer disease. The frequent use of these spices may be a possible reason for the fever incidence of Alzheimer in Asian countries. Further in vivo studies are required to find its action and studies to find the exact compound responsible for the action.


Author(s):  
Kathryn C. Ibata-Arens

What explains the rapid and sustained economic rise of Asian countries in high-technology industries, including biomedicals? The biomedical industry, comprised mainly of biopharmaceuticals and medical devices, is among the fastest growing globally and has been an economic-development target of national governments around the world. The book presents a conceptual framework to assess national government management of innovation and entrepreneurship in the fast-growing biomedical industry in Asia, which at current growth rates is on track to become the center of the world economy. Four Asian countries—China, India, Japan, and Singapore—are compared in terms of innovation capacities, government policy, and firm-level strategies underlying competitive advantages in high technology. The book argues that countries that pursue networked technonationalism have been effective in upgrading innovation capacity and also encouraging entrepreneurial activity in targeted industries. The study begins with a global-level analysis of biomedical innovation and entrepreneurship, identifying emerging concentrations of scientific citation, patenting, and firm creation—paying close attention to trends in Asian economies and future prospects. Findings indicate a gradual shift to Asian economies of many biomedical-innovation and new-business-creation activities. The book concludes with implications for innovation policy and entrepreneurship strategy in Asia and elsewhere.


Author(s):  
Ellen Taylor ◽  
Sue Hignett

Thinking in patient safety has evolved over time from more simplistic accident causation models to more robust frameworks of work system design. Throughout this evolution, less consideration has been given to the role of the built environment in supporting safety. The aim of this paper is to theoretically explore how we think about harm as a systems problem by mitigating the risk of adverse events through proactive healthcare facility design. We review the evolution of thinking in safety as a safety science. Using falls as a case study topic, we use a previously published model (SCOPE: Safety as Complexity of the Organization, People, and Environment) to develop an expanded framework. The resulting theoretical model and matrix, DEEP SCOPE (DEsigning with Ergonomic Principles), provide a way to synthesize design interventions into a systems-based model for healthcare facility design using human factors/ergonomics (HF/E) design principles. The DEEP SCOPE matrix is proposed to highlight the design of safe healthcare facilities as an ergonomic problem of design that fits the environment to the user by understanding built environments that support the “human” factor.


2020 ◽  
Vol 30 (Supplement_5) ◽  
Author(s):  
S Rivolta ◽  
M Letzgus ◽  
F De Nard ◽  
M Gaiazzi ◽  
N Principi ◽  
...  

Abstract Background Adequate vaccination coverage among healthcare workers, including students in healthcare professions (SHPs), is crucial in order to prevent spreading of infections within healthcare facilities. However, vaccination coverage among SHPs is often inadequate. We aimed to describe the vaccination/immunization status of SHPs of the University of Milan. Methods We spread an e-survey to the academic e-mail addresses of postgraduate medical residents and to first- and last-year undergraduate SHPs. The questionnaire covered sociodemographic data (age, sex, education, municipality of residence, internship in high-risk wards) and the reported vaccination/immunization status for Influenza (previous flu season), Varicella, MPR and DTaP vaccines. Results Among 5743 invited SHPs, 884 participated in the survey. The study sample comprised 462 medical residents and 422 undergraduate SHPs (medicine 176, nursery 186, midwifery 4, healthcare assistance 32, prevention techniques 24). Median age was 27 years (IQR 7); 68.4% participants were female; 91.3% had attended high school in a lyceum, while others in a professional (2.9%) or technical (5.8%) institute; 36.7% lived in municipalities of &lt; 20.000 inhabitants, while 26.1% of &gt; 250.000. Traineeships took place in high-risk wards for 46% of participants. Reported vaccination coverage for Influenza was 33,7% (with higher coverage for pediatric nursing and midwifery students, medicine students and medical residents). Participants reported immunity (either vaccine or natural immunity) to Varicella in 93,3% cases. Declared vaccination coverage for Hepatitis B was 94,1%; 91,7% participants reportedly completed the MPR schedule, 76,2% the recommended DTaP booster. Conclusions Influenza vaccination coverage was suboptimal in our sample of SHPs, suggesting the need of specific educational programs and targeted vaccination campaigns, which may help shaping a positive vaccination attitude for future healthcare professionals. Key messages Immunization status for VPDs is suboptimal among Italian students in healthcare professions. The monitoring of the immunization status should include healthcare students actively involved in healthcare activities.


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