Penanggulangan Sampah Masker Medis Sekali Pakai dengan Pendekatan “Village Health Volunteers” di Kota Surabaya Pada Masa Pandemi Covid-19

This article aims to find out that a Village Health Volunteer approach can be an innovation in handling disposable medical mask waste in the city of Surabaya which incidentally cannot be recycled. This causes it to have the potential to transmit disease if disposable medical masks are reused. The problem in this study is focused on disposable medical mask waste that has not been handled properly from the government side, the community itself and future estimates if left continuously will cause the environment to become worse due to the risk of cross-contamination or biological hazards if polluting the environment. The research method used is literature review. The results of this study explain that the Village Health Volunteer approach can be a way between the government and the community to work together in dealing with health, in this case the handling of disposable medical mask waste. During this pandemic, the use of disposable medical masks by the public has increased so that the waste of disposable medical masks has increased and the risk of cross-contamination or biological hazards by disposable medical mask waste has increased healthy.

The properties of hot household hygroscopic materials and their potential use for non-medical facemask decontamination

The widespread use of facemasks throughout the population is recommended by the WHO to reduce transmission of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. As some regions of the world are facing mask shortages, reuse may be necessary. However, used masks are considered as a potential hazard that may spread and transmit disease if they are not decontaminated correctly and systematically before reuse. As a result, the inappropriate decontamination practices that are commonly witnessed in the general public are challenging management of the epidemic at a large scale. To achieve public acceptance and implementation, decontamination procedures need to be low-cost and simple. We propose the use of hot hygroscopic materials to decontaminate non-medical facemasks in household settings. We report on the inactivation of a viral load on a facial mask exposed to hot hygroscopic materials for 15 minutes. As opposed to recent academic studies whereby decontamination is achieved by maintaining heat and humidity above a given value, a more flexible procedure is proposed here using a slow decaying pattern, which is both effective and easier to implement, suggesting straightforward public deployment and hence reliable implementation by the population.

Next-generation tools to control biting midge populations and reduce pathogen transmission

Biting midges of the genus Culicoides transmit disease-causing agents resulting in a significant economic impact on livestock industries in many parts of the world. Localized control efforts, such as removal of larval habitat or pesticide application, can be logistically difficult, expensive and ineffective if not instituted and maintained properly. With these limitations, a population-level approach to the management of Culicoides midges should be investigated as a means to replace or supplement existing control strategies. Next-generation control methods such as Wolbachia- and genetic-based population suppression and replacement are being investigated in several vector species. Here we assess the feasibility and applicability of these approaches for use against biting midges. We also discuss the technical and logistical hurdles needing to be addressed for each method to be successful, as well as emphasize the importance of addressing community engagement and involving stakeholders in the investigation and development of these approaches.

Control of malaria-transmitting mosquitoes using gene drives

Gene drives are selfish genetic elements that can be re-designed to invade a population and they hold tremendous potential for the control of mosquitoes that transmit disease. Much progress has been made recently in demonstrating proof of principle for gene drives able to suppress populations of malarial mosquitoes, or to make them refractory to the Plasmodium parasites they transmit. This has been achieved using CRISPR-based gene drives. In this article, I will discuss the relative merits of this type of gene drive, as well as barriers to its technical development and to its deployment in the field as malaria control. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Novel control strategies for mosquito-borne diseases'.

Invisible epidemics: ethics and asymptomatic infection

Interactions between microbes and human hosts can lead to a wide variety of possible outcomes including benefits to the host, asymptomatic infection, disease (which can be more or less severe), and/or death. Whether or not they themselves eventually develop disease, asymptomatic carriers can often transmit disease-causing pathogens to others. This phenomenon has a range of ethical implications for clinical medicine, public health, and infectious disease research. The implications of asymptomatic infection are especially significant in situations where, and/or to the extent that, the microbe in question is transmissible, potentially harmful, and/or untreatable. This article reviews the history and concept of asymptomatic infection, and relevant ethical issues associated with this phenomenon. It illustrates the role and ethical significance of asymptomatic infection in outbreaks, epidemics, and pandemics–including recent crises involving drug resistance, Zika, and Covid19. Serving as the Introduction to this Special Issue of Monash Bioethics Review, it also provides brief summaries of the other articles comprising this collection.

Analisis Model Matematika Penyebaran Penyakit Kolera Dengan Mempertimbangkan Masa Inkubasi

Cholera is a type of diarrheal disease caused by the presence of Vibrio cholerae in the patient's intestine. Bacteria V. cholerae has the ability to survive in water so that it will easily transmit disease to humans. This study discusses the dynamics of the spread of cholera caused by V. cholerae bacteria. The incubation period in the disease transmission system is a factor that considered in a compiled mathematical model. Besides giving the vaccine is considered a powerful way to reduce the rate of transmission. This study aims to modify the mathematical model of the spread of cholera, carry out the analysis of the stability of the modified model, and carry out numerical simulations. The modified model will be determined by its equilibrium and then stability analysis will be carried out at the equilibrium by considering the basic reproduction number (R0). Modification of the model with consideration of the incubation period produces a mathematical model of the spread of cholera type SVEIR-B. The stability of a fixed point is influenced by R0. The condition value R0 < 1 resulting in a disease-free equilibrium that is asymptotically stable, whereas the condition R0 > 1 results in an endemic equilibrium being asymptotically stable. Numerical simulations show an increase in the rate of vaccine delivery can decrease the value while increasing the rate of vaccine shrinkage and the incubation rate of each can increase the value.

Kemeny-based testing for COVID-19

Testing, tracking and tracing abilities have been identified as pivotal in helping countries to safely reopen activities after the first wave of the COVID-19 virus. Contact tracing apps give the unprecedented possibility to reconstruct graphs of daily contacts, so the question is: who should be tested? As human contact networks are known to exhibit community structure, in this paper we show that the Kemeny constant of a graph can be used to identify and analyze bridges between communities in a graph. Our ‘Kemeny indicator’ is the value of the Kemeny constant in the new graph that is obtained when a node is removed from the original graph. We show that testing individuals who are associated with large values of the Kemeny indicator can help in efficiently intercepting new virus outbreaks, when they are still in their early stage. Extensive simulations provide promising results in early identification and in blocking the possible ‘super-spreaders’ links that transmit disease between different communities.

Utilization of Bar Soap (Sabbath) Becomes Liquid Hand Soap to Prevent the Spread of Covid-19 (Community Service in Singocandi Village, City District, Kudus Regency)

<p><em>The problems of the people of Singocandi Village RT 001 RW 002 related to the habit of using bar soap as hand washing soap are increasing. Bar soap is recommended to only be used by one person. The use of bar soap interchangeably is not recommended because it is not hygienic and is thought to be able to transmit disease. Moreover, it is used as hand soap by the whole family. The purpose of the activity of using bar soap into liquid hand washing soap is a form of the Covid-19 Community Service Program which is carried out in Singocandi Village to maintain cleanliness and body health and increase the creativity of local residents. Processing of bar soap, if developed, is expected to increase the habit of a clean and healthy lifestyle and increase income in Singocandi Village. The method of implementation carried out in this activity is: (1) delivery of material on how to make liquid hand soap from bar soap. (2) practice with the children of RT 001 / RW 002.The result is increased knowledge, innovation and creativity, the creation of liquid soap products, and habits of a clean and healthy lifestyle</em></p>

Variability of Salivary and Nasal Specimens for SARS-CoV-2 Detection

In a large cohort of ambulatory confirmed COVID-19 patients with multiple self-collected sample time points, we compared 202 matched nasal-oropharyngeal swabs and oral salivary fluid sample pairs by RT-PCR. Nasal-oropharyngeal swabs were more sensitive than this salivary sample type (oral crevicular fluid) suggesting that not all saliva sample types have equivalent sensitivity. However, all samples that were Vero E6-TMPRSS2 cell culture positive (e.g., infectious virus) were also oral fluid RT-PCR positive suggesting that oral fluid may find the patients most likely to transmit disease to others.