Transmission of Onychomycosis and Dermatophytosis between Household Members: A Scoping Review

Onychomycosis is a common fungal infection of the nail, caused by dermatophytes, non-dermatophytes, and yeasts. Predisposing factors include older age, trauma, diabetes, immunosuppression, and previous history of nail psoriasis or tinea pedis. Though many biological risk factors have been well characterized, the role of the environment has been less clear. Studies have found evidence of transmission in 44% to 47% of households with at least one affected individual, but the underlying mechanisms and risk factors for transmission of onychomycosis between household members are incompletely understood. A scoping literature review was performed to characterize and summarize environmental risk factors involved in the transmission of onychomycosis within households. A total of 90 papers met the inclusion criteria, and extracted data was analyzed in an iterative manner. Shared household surfaces may harbor dermatophytes and provide sources for infection. Shared household equipment, including footwear, bedding, and nail tools, may transmit dermatophytes. The persistence of dermatophytes on household cleaning supplies, linen, and pets may serve as lasting sources of infection. Based on these findings, we provide recommendations that aim to interrupt household transmission of onychomycosis. Further investigation of the specific mechanisms behind household spread is needed to break the cycle of transmission, reducing the physical and social impacts of onychomycosis.

Mrs Hinch, the rise of the cleanfluencer and the neoliberal refashioning of housework: Scouring away the crisis?

This article extends sociological and feminist accounts of housework by examining the social significance of the rise of the ‘cleanfluencer’: online influencers who supply household cleaning and organization tips and modes of lifestyle aspiration via social media. We focus on ‘Mrs Hinch’; aka Sophie Hinchliffe from Essex, the ‘homegrown’ Instagram star with 4.1 million followers who shares daily images and stories of cleaning and family life, and has a series of bestselling books, regular daytime TV appearances and supermarket tie-ins. We argue that, within neoliberal culture, housework is now often refashioned as a form of therapy for women’s stressful lives: stresses that neoliberalism and patriarchy have both generated and compounded. The argument is developed through three sections. First, we locate Mrs Hinch in relation to longer classed, gendered and racialized histories of domestic labour and the figure of the ‘housewife’, and the re-writing of domestic narratives to find new ways of ensuring women’s willingness to participate in unpaid domestic labour. Second, we analyse the contradictions of cleanfluencing as a form of ‘digital identity labour’ representing offline housework, which in this case is precarious and classed. Finally, drawing these themes together, we show how ‘Hinching’ recasts housework as part of a neoliberal therapeutic promise to ‘clean away’ the instabilities, anxieties and threats of contemporary culture.

Poisoning in Children and adolescents assisted during the COVID-19 pandemic at the Toxicological Information and Assistance Center in Federal District, Brazil (CIATOX -DF): Descriptive, Cross-sectional, and Analytical study with 1.037 patients

Exogenous poisonings are one of the principal accidents involving children and adolescents. The social isolation promoted by the COVID-19 pandemic raises concerns about the possibility of an increase in poisoning among children since most cases of poisoning occur in home environments. Therefore, the present study evaluated exogenous poisonings in children under ten years of age and adolescents aged 11 to 20 years old through data recorded at the Toxicological Information and Assistance Center in the Federal District (CIATOX-DF) from January to September 2020. The results showed a change in the number of notifications, with 1.037 poisonings registered in patients under 20 years of age. Registrations of poisoning by venomous animals, medications, and household cleaning products in children tend to be higher in months of vacation. This study demonstrated poisoning notifications by non-venomous animals in March and April and household cleaning products as the second leading cause of exogenous poisoning, demonstrating a clear temporal association among social isolation, increased use of household cleaning products, and exposure to these products. The multivariate analysis methodology managed to show the significant characteristics of the studied sample, contributing to creating local actions that aim to reduce the number of preventable cases of poisonings.

Paid domestic work and outsourcing in South Africa: Clients’ views on trust, control and power relations

Outsourced domestic cleaning service suppliers reconfigure the bipartite employment relationship between employers and domestic workers into a tripartite one between clients (former employers of domestic workers), the management or franchise owners, and domestic employees. While this transformation is attractive to some, outsourcing domestic work involves more than the outsourcing of physical tasks of household cleaning. It also involves the outsourcing of the employment relationship where trust, control and power relations are passed on to the management of the domestic cleaning service suppliers. By taking trust, control and power relations as being reconfigured through outsourcing, this article debates why such reconfiguring might not be convenient for some. By doing this, trust, control and power are conceptualised and how it is perpetuated in a bipartite and tripartite domestic employment relationship. By drawing on 16 in-depth interviews with former clients of a domestic cleaning service supplier in South Africa, this article illustrates that perhaps outsourced domestic services are not an appropriate solution to everyone’s domestic cleaning needs and that some clients expect a particular relationship that is not achieved through outsourcing.