Assessing the Vulnerability of Rural Households to Floods at Pol-e Dokhtar Region in Iran

The agricultural sector in rural areas is seriously affected by climate change, affecting agricultural production and farming communities. This paper investigates rural households’ vulnerability to floods in the seven agricultural-based regions of Pol-e Dokhtar, south of Lorestan Province, Iran. The primary data for the vulnerability indicators were collected from 322 households. Three main components of vulnerability, including exposure, sensitivity, and adaptive capacity, were measured using the obtained data. The weighting of indicators was done by the MSF method and using MATLAB software. The results showed that the social and economic characteristics of households affect their vulnerability to floods. The Jayder, Mamolan, and Afrineh regions, which were more exposed to floods, had less capacity for adaptation. The results showed that the most vulnerable communities could be described by characteristics such as low levels of agricultural insurance, limited access to credit, low levels of income diversification, high levels of unemployment, low levels of social capital, higher dependency ratios, and poor infrastructure. This research showed that diversified livelihoods have a significant effect on reducing farmers’ sensitivity to floods. The study proposes policy implications to increase resilience and reduce farmers’ vulnerability to floods. The government and other development partners should prioritize the most vulnerable areas by improving their access to finance and providing the technical assistance required for increasing their coping capacity.

Economic Burden of Inpatient Wound Dressing in Nigeria: Implication for Catastrophic Household Expenditure

Background: The literature is replete with family impoverishment resulting from out of pocket healthcare financing on the Africa continent. In Nigeria the healthcare insurance scheme is evolving and requires wider coverage. The aim of this study is to examine catastrophic household expenditure emanating from daily or alternate day wound dressing.Methods. The study was based on a descriptive cross-sectional research design to investigate the economic burden of daily or alternate day wound dressing among hospitalized patients in selected teaching hospitals in south west Nigeria. The inclusion criteria focused on inpatients about to be discharged or already spent minimum of four weeks in hospital. The data collection instrument was pre-tested with a coefficient of stability of 0.774. Respondents were selected via convenience sampling while an interview administered questionnaire was used to elicit information on wound care from patients in medical surgical wards. Covid-19 protocols were strictly adhered to and ethical approval was sought from each hospital.Results: The result revealed that the mean age of the respondents was 44.95 ± 16.12. Two-thirds were men who are artisans and traders with only secondary school education. Over 70% of the respondents have between 5 and 10 family members, more than 50% earn less than ₦50000 per month. The majority have no comorbidities (79.5%), about 50% were on daily dressing which required 1–5 moderate or major dressing packs per week. The length of hospital stay for the majority of the respondents (85.3%) was less than 11 weeks.Conclusions: The daily or alternate day wound dressing requires a financial input beyond the coping capacity of the indigenous Nigerian families. The Nigerian government should scale up coverage of health insurance scheme to cover artisans, small traders and other low income earners to reduce the incidence of catastrophic household expenditure.

Increased psychological distress after the lifting of COVID-19 lockdown in the Saudi population: a cross-sectional study

Background Amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and its global health and socioeconomic aftereffects, the enduring state of crisis is increasingly impacting the coping capacity of the populations. In this study, we aimed to characterize the levels of psychological distress after the lifting of COVID-19 lockdown. Results The Impact of Event Scale (IES-R) and Depression, Anxiety, and Stress Scales-21 items (DASS-21) were used to screen for post-traumatic stress syndrome (PTSD), depression, anxiety, and stress. The prevalence of PTSD was 41.6% and was associated with severe or extremely severe stress (27.8%), anxiety (31.4%), and depression (39.0%). All disorders were strongly correlated with one another. The risk of developing PTSD was independently associated with residence in high COVID-19 prevalence region (OR = 2.25, p = 0.004), poor (OR = 3.98, p = 0.002), or moderate (OR = 1.63, p = 0.048) self-assessed overall physical health, psychiatric comorbidity (OR = 1.87, p = 0.036), number of COVID-19-like symptoms (OR = 1.94, p = 0.039), and severe COVID-19 morbidity in the acquaintances (OR = 1.54, p = 0.026). Four theories were proposed to explain these high figures, with a discussion of their practical implications. Conclusions The lifting of lockdown measures was associated with a substantial increase in psychological distress among the Saudi population, referring to figures reported during the lockdown. This may indicate a decline in the overall population’s coping capacity with the enduring crisis.

Reintroducing the GeoNames that features the land and water near the Montufar and Bingay Points in Prieto Diaz, Sorsogon, Philippines

Purpose–The paper aims to generate analytical data to reintroduce the geographic naming based on the existing coastwise feature names as part of contextualizing the ecosystem relative to risk reality phenomena that are based on the actual land and water uses inthe study area.Method–ArcGIS platform was used to assess the following: (i) coastwise feature names based on the Special Report of the United States Board of Geographic Names Relating to the Geographic Names in the Philippine Island, (ii) Topographical features and feature names, (iii) politico-administrativeand planning subdivisions, (iv) income classification of the study area, (v) natural and physical map features of the study area, (vi) disaster risk reality phenomenon, (vii) The Agta IPs environmental and Disaster RiskReduction Practices relative to the ecosystem and actual uses of land and water in the study areaResults–Coastwise feature naming describes the physical environment that features the mountain, river, historical, cultural, or events being named, etc. The Coastwise feature names are essential in improving and promoting eco-tourism activities on the coast of Prieto Diaz as the home of the indigenous people who traditionally settle and move to another settlement merely remaining speaking their mother tongue"Agta Tabangnon and Bicol Sorsogon''. Although the income classification of Prieto Diaz is low, during the COVID-19 lockdown the locally produced food supply was sufficient to feed Prieto Diaznon. This implies that the coping capacity during pandemic somehow hinted that the land and water utilization remain stable municipal wide. It generally implies the friendliness of Prieto Diaznon which resembles the indigenous people's friendliness to the environment before the Spaniards colonization. The natural resources are generally conserved and protected although some built-up areas were impacted by the calamities and natural hazards. But in terms of disaster risk reality was calculated to be 92% which means the study area is somewhat resilient to resilient municipalities. The remaining 8% are areas mostly located in low-lying and coastal areas.Conclusion–The coastwise feature names relating to the geographic names in the Philippine Islands remain in use for coastal directions, research to monitor sedimentation significant in assessing the general development of a regional understanding of the vegetation and climate dynamics, and weather forecasts. This study concludes that the coastwise feature names or geographic names are significant to characterize the riskor resiliency realities of the old barrios up to the present barangays. Furthermore, the coastwise feature names relating to the geographic names in the Philippine Islands remain useful to attract more tourists and researchers to visit a place virtually or on-site during and after the COVID-19 pandemic.Recommendations–Reintroduction of the geographic names by way of contextualization risk or resilience reality theory of Abante (2021a;2020a) and incorporating the of the Popper (1978)theory on "worldof contents of thought",Meiring (1993) theory on 'place names', and Quine (1953) cited the Strawson's logical theory of reference on backing the naming with descriptions can also reintroduce a place starting from the 'VisitangDaan' myth up to the present barangays via internet especially during the new normal after COVID-19 pandemic to strengthen linkages and trading.

Rural Livelihoods at Risk: A Case of Devghat Gaunpalika in the Western Hills, Nepal

People's livelihood determines by a variety of factors- availability of assets, opportunities, and restrictions created by the environment, and people's evaluation of these factors. The present paper aims to analyze adversities of rural livelihoods focusing on the case of Devghat Gaunpalika of Tanahun district, Nepal. This article is based on primary data/information acquired from a field survey conducted during December 2017 through group discussion, key informant interview, and field observation. People in the Devghat area perform farm and off-farm activities to eke out wide shorts of their livelihood needs. However, livelihood in this area is at risk owing to combination of adversities such as food insufficiency, shortage of facilities and services, low level of educational attainment, lower household income, and others. Three-fourth of the households adopted agriculture as their main occupation to fulfil their household needs. Household income is low. About of 62 percent households earn below NRs 5000 per month. Twenty-five percent of the population earns their livelihood by working as wage-based labors. A low level of educational attainment and poor coping capacity also indicate local livelihoods at risk.

Development and Validation of the Coping Capacity Measurement Scale of Public Health Emergencies in China

Public health emergency coping capacity has been an important direction in crisis research in recent years. The use of the public health emergency coping capacity scale to evaluate the public’s response and feelings regarding public health emergencies is one of the essential ways to improve the effectiveness of public health emergency response. Based on literature research, this paper constructed the theoretical dimension of public health emergency coping ability and completed the development of the items of the initial scale in China. After using SPSS 22.0-conducted exploratory factor analysis, confirmatory factor analysis, and reliability test, the scale dimensions and items were deleted and optimized. The final public health emergency coping capacity measurement scale in China included 12 items and four dimensions. The results showed that the developed scale has high reliability and validity, which is helpful for the relevant personnel to understand the level of public health emergency coping ability and provides an essential basis for timely and accurate emergency prevention and control interventions.

COPING STYLE OF PARENTS OF PEDIATRIC CANCER PATIENTS AT A HOSPITAL A LIMA

The coping that parents present with their child with cancer, they tend to differentiate and adapt during the situations that their child presents during each stage of treatment. The objective is to determine the Coping Style of parents of pediatric cancer patients at a Hospital in Lima. In the results, 1.2% of the study participants (2/168) have a medium coping capacity, while the majority, equivalent to 98.8% (166/168), have a high capacity of coping. It is concluded that a comprehensive care program should be accessed where it allows to elevate the areas affected by the stressful situation during the disease and by the aspects involved in having a family member with cancer.

The mediating role of the work-family conflict in the relationship between technostress and psychological well-being in the COVID-19 pandemic context

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought dramatic changes both for work and employees’ personal and family life domains. In this context, this research investigates the mediating role of the work-family conflict in the relationship between technostress creators (techno-overload and techno-invasion) and psychological well-being. We conducted a survey of 217 employees and the results indicated that the work-family conflict fully mediated the relationship between techno-overload and psychological well-being, thus strongly affecting the psychological well-being of employees in the context of exposure to the stress generated by ICTs overload. Similar results were identified regarding the mediating role of work-family conflict in the relationship between techno-invasion and psychological well-being. The findings suggest the need to increase the coping capacity of employees with technostress and their psychological well-being by reducing the work-family conflict and technostress.

Impact of extreme weather events in Indian agriculture : Enhancing the coping capacity of farm families

In the context of climate change, extreme weather events are emerging as a potential threat to food security and farmers livelihoods. Considerable proportion of the revenue is being spent in addressing the damages caused due to these intense events. Extreme precipitation (both flood and drought) and temperature are crucial in causing detrimental impact on crop yield and production. Particularly, the impacts of extreme events will be more in rainfed agriculture due to interannual precipitation variability over the growing season in terms of crop yield and yield quality. Several studies have forecasted its increased occurrence and estimated its impact on agricultural productivity. Nevertheless, field level operational strategies to address these risks are easily not accessible to men and women farmers in that specific context. Since these events are localized in geographical scale, decentralised approach in the framework of ‘preparedness and recovery’ is suggested to combat the loss of lives, livelihoods and assets of men and women farmers. In this backdrop, the paper suggests few simple practical decentralised strategies to support the vast majority of small holders in our country.