Environmental Health Insights最新文献

{"title":"The Current Pathogenicity and Potential Risk Evaluation of Marburg Virus to Cause Mysterious \"Disease X\"-An Update on Recent Evidences.","authors":"Rahima Akter Mitu, Md Rabiul Islam","doi":"10.1177/11786302241235809","DOIUrl":"10.1177/11786302241235809","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>The World Health Organization (WHO) defined Disease X as an upcoming disease with the potential to cause a pandemic. Pathogen X is responsible for Disease X. Marburg virus disease (MVD) is one of the diseases from the priority disease list published by WHO. Marburg virus is a filamentous, negative-sense RNA virus that belongs to the same filovirus family as the lethal Ebola virus. Since the first discovery of this virus in 1967, 17 outbreaks occurred sporadically till 2023. <i>Rousettus aegyptiacus</i> acts as the natural reservoir of the virus. With an average incubation period of 5 to 10 days, its first target is the mononuclear phagocytic system cells. It is highly contagious and can be easily transmitted from animal to human and human to human via direct contact with blood or body fluid, feces, and semen of the infected host. Although Marburg disease has a high case fatality rate of close to 90%, unfortunately, there is no approved vaccines or treatments are available. The most recent outbreak of Marburg virus in Equatorial Guinea and Tanzania in 2023 caused an alert for global health. However, based on the last global pandemic of COVID-19 and the sudden re-emerging of monkeypox around the world, we can assume that the Marburg virus has the potential to cause a global pandemic. Our modern world depends on globalization, which helps the virus transmission among countries. The Marburg virus can easily be transmitted to humans by fruit bats of the Pteropodidae family. This virus causes severe hemorrhagic disease, and there are no specific vaccines and treatments available to combat it. Therefore, community engagement and early supportive care for patients are keys to successfully controlling MVD.</p>","PeriodicalId":11827,"journal":{"name":"Environmental Health Insights","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2024-03-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10910879/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140027727","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Development and Evaluation of Ensemble Learning-based Environmental Methane Detection and Intensity Prediction Models.","authors":"Reek Majumder, Jacquan Pollard, M Sabbir Salek, David Werth, Gurcan Comert, Adrian Gale, Sakib Mahmud Khan, Samuel Darko, Mashrur Chowdhury","doi":"10.1177/11786302241227307","DOIUrl":"10.1177/11786302241227307","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>The environmental impacts of global warming driven by methane (CH₄) emissions have catalyzed significant research initiatives in developing novel technologies that enable proactive and rapid detection of CH₄. Several data-driven machine learning (ML) models were tested to determine how well they identified fugitive CH₄ and its related intensity in the affected areas. Various meteorological characteristics, including wind speed, temperature, pressure, relative humidity, water vapor, and heat flux, were included in the simulation. We used the ensemble learning method to determine the best-performing weighted ensemble ML models built upon several weaker lower-layer ML models to (i) detect the presence of CH₄ as a classification problem and (ii) predict the intensity of CH₄ as a regression problem. The classification model performance for CH₄ detection was evaluated using accuracy, F1 score, Matthew's Correlation Coefficient (MCC), and the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC ROC), with the top-performing model being 97.2%, 0.972, 0.945 and 0.995, respectively. The <i>R</i>² score was used to evaluate the regression model performance for CH₄ intensity prediction, with the <i>R</i>² score of the best-performing model being 0.858. The ML models developed in this study for fugitive CH₄ detection and intensity prediction can be used with fixed environmental sensors deployed on the ground or with sensors mounted on unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) for mobile detection.</p>","PeriodicalId":11827,"journal":{"name":"Environmental Health Insights","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2024-02-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10901066/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139989676","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Assessment of Urogenital Schistosomiasis Knowledge, Attitudes and Practices Among Abobo Communities in Gambella Regional State, Southwestern Ethiopia.","authors":"Tigist Mohammed, Abraham Degarege, Mulugeta Aemero, Abebe Animut, Yohannes Negash, Berhanu Erko","doi":"10.1177/11786302241234731","DOIUrl":"10.1177/11786302241234731","url":null,"abstract":"<p><strong>Background: </strong>Knowledge about community awareness and practices related to a disease, among other things, helps to plan relevant control strategies. This study assessed the knowledge, attitude, and practices (KAPs) of the community in Abobo district of Gambella Regional State in Southwestern Ethiopia about urogenital schistosomiasis (UGS), which is endemic to the region.</p><p><strong>Methods: </strong>A community-based cross-sectional study was conducted in 2022. A pretested structured questionnaire was administered. Multivariable logistic regression was used to examine factors associated with KAPs variables.</p><p><strong>Results: </strong>Most study participants (90.6%) responded they have previously heard of UGS. Over 95% of the participants knew at least 1 symptom of UGS and 30% knew the transmission cycle. About 15.9% and 26.8% knew keeping environmental hygiene and refraining from using cercariae infested water, as preventive methods, respectively. Over half of the participants (50.1%) disagreed or did not know that urinating close to the river/dam water contributes to transmission, and almost all participants had contact with the dam/river water in one way or another. Education status and history of having the infection were the key significant correlates of most KAPs variables.</p><p><strong>Conclusion: </strong>Most of the community members had poor knowledge and attitudes about the mode of transmission and preventive measures of UGS. Thus, besides school-based mass drug administration (MDA), UGS control efforts in the region should incorporate health education in conjunction with safe water supplies, and provision of sanitary facilities to effectively reduce the transmission of the disease.</p>","PeriodicalId":11827,"journal":{"name":"Environmental Health Insights","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2024-02-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10898313/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139982715","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"WASH Levels and Associated Human Health Risks in War-Prone West African Countries: A Global Indicators Study (2015 to 2021).","authors":"Michael Aboah","doi":"10.1177/11786302241228427","DOIUrl":"10.1177/11786302241228427","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) levels have been shown to have impacts on health. However, the knowledge of WASH levels in war-prone West African countries is limited. The study extracted data (2015-2021) from the Joint Monitoring Programme (WHO/UNICEF), World Bank and Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS) to estimate WASH levels in the study countries. Pearson correlation analysis was used to establish the association among the WASH levels. Results showed that women had better access to safe water (56.39%), good sanitation (59.36%) and good hygiene (60.23%) compared to men. The urban population had better access to safe water (57.60%), good sanitation (61.23%), and good hygiene (65.65%) than the rural population. Among the countries under study, Nigeria had the highest access to safe water (36.10%) and good sanitation (24.41%), while Mali had the highest access to good hygiene (27.93%). Pearson correlation analysis showed a strong positive association between safe water and good hygiene (<i>r</i> = .998), safe water and sanitation (<i>r</i> = .996) and hygiene and sanitation (<i>r</i> = .998) at .00 significant levels. Based on the findings, it is recommended that integrated WASH programmes with combined infrastructure development, behaviour change campaigns and community engagement should be encouraged to ensure peaceful and sustainable access to WASH levels.</p>","PeriodicalId":11827,"journal":{"name":"Environmental Health Insights","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2024-02-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10868510/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139740735","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Chinese Pneumonia Outbreak 2023: Is It Reasonable to Be Concerned If the Illness is a Novel Strain of Disease X?","authors":"Syed Masudur Rahman Dewan, Mohammad Safiqul Islam","doi":"10.1177/11786302241233426","DOIUrl":"10.1177/11786302241233426","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":11827,"journal":{"name":"Environmental Health Insights","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2024-02-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10868477/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139740734","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Hand Washing Practice and Food Insecurity are Associated With Undernutrition of Breastfeeding Mothers in Rural Ethiopia: A Cross-sectional Study.","authors":"Alemneh Kabeta Daba, Kebede Abegaz, Anbissa Muleta, Beruk Berhanu Desalegn","doi":"10.1177/11786302241231708","DOIUrl":"10.1177/11786302241231708","url":null,"abstract":"<p><strong>Background: </strong>Breastfeeding mothers are prone to undernutrition. However, factors contributing to maternal undernutrition are not exhaustively understood. Hence, this study aimed to determine prevalence of undernutrition among breastfeeding mothers and identify associated factors.</p><p><strong>Methods: </strong>A cross-sectional study was conducted among 606 breastfeeding mothers from selected rural districts in Oromia and Sidama regional states of Ethiopia. Data were collected through an interviewer-administered questionnaire. Nutritional status was assessed using body mass index (BMI) and mid-upper-arm-circumference (MUAC). Logistic regression analysis was used to identify factors associated with maternal undernutrition.</p><p><strong>Results: </strong>One out of ten breastfeeding mothers was found undernourished as determined by BMI (12.6%) and MUAC (10.7%). Mothers who did not practice hand washing after cleaning children's bottom were 2 and 3 times more likely to be undernourished compared to their counters, as measured by BMI (AOR = 2.29, <i>P</i> = .002) and MUAC (AOR = 3.03, <i>P</i> < .001), respectively. Mothers living in mildly or moderately food insecure households (AOR = 2.37, <i>P</i> = .019) were more than two times more likely to be undernourished as determined by MUAC. Mothers who breastfed children in the age range of 9 to 11 (AOR = 2.79, <i>P</i> = .025) or 12 to 23 (AOR = 2.57, <i>P</i> = .018) months were more than two and half times more likely to be undernourished as determined by BMI.</p><p><strong>Conclusions: </strong>Maternal undernutrition is a medium-level public health problem in rural districts of Oromia and Sidama regional states in Ethiopia. The lack of hand washing practice after cleaning a child's bottom, household food insecurity and higher child age increased the odds of maternal undernutrition. Mothers should prioritize and improve their nutritional care as the age of their breastfed child increases. Nutrition programs in rural districts of Ethiopia should also aim to improve personal hygiene practices and food insecurity integrated with implementation researches to evaluate program's impact on nutritional status of breastfeeding mothers.</p>","PeriodicalId":11827,"journal":{"name":"Environmental Health Insights","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2024-02-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10865933/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139734764","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Understanding Households' Willingness to Pay for Improved Sanitation Services in Benin: A Study Protocol.","authors":"Nicolas Gaffan, Alphonse Kpozehouen, Cyriaque Degbey, Yolaine Glele Ahanhanzo, Moussiliou Noël Paraïso","doi":"10.1177/11786302241228954","DOIUrl":"10.1177/11786302241228954","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Nowadays, in Benin, latrine construction by households highly depends on their financial contributions. However, empirical evidence shows that many households are unwilling to invest in adequate sanitation services. The study aims to determine the household's willingness to pay for improved sanitation services and the associated factors. The study population will include households lacking unimproved sanitation facilities. The household heads will be eligible for survey participation. We will perform a contingent valuation to determine households' willingness to pay for a Ventilated Improved Pit (VIP) latrine. Following a description of the surveyed population, we will assess willingness to pay using the '<i>doubleb</i>' command in Stata. Subsequently, we will conduct multivariate logistic regression to determine the factors associated with willingness to pay. The expected results will be: a description of the basic characteristics of households without improved sanitation services, an estimation of household willingness to pay for VIP latrines using the contingent valuation, and factors associated with household willingness to pay for VIP latrines. This study will contribute to the literature on household demand for improved sanitation services in Benin.</p>","PeriodicalId":11827,"journal":{"name":"Environmental Health Insights","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2024-02-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10846040/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139697176","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Prenatal Metal Exposures and Child Social Responsiveness Scale Scores in 2 Prospective Studies.","authors":"Emma X Yu, John F Dou, Heather E Volk, Kelly M Bakulski, Kelly Benke, Irva Hertz-Picciotto, Rebecca J Schmidt, Craig J Newschaffer, Jason I Feinberg, Jason Daniels, Margaret Daniele Fallin, Christine Ladd-Acosta, Ghassan B Hamra","doi":"10.1177/11786302231225313","DOIUrl":"10.1177/11786302231225313","url":null,"abstract":"<p><strong>Background: </strong>Prenatal exposure to metals is hypothesized to be associated with child autism. We aim to investigate the joint and individual effects of prenatal exposure to urine metals including lead (Pb), mercury (Hg), manganese (Mn), and selenium (Se) on child Social Responsiveness Scale (SRS) scores.</p><p><strong>Methods: </strong>We used data from 2 cohorts enriched for likelihood of autism spectrum disorder (ASD): Early Autism Risk Longitudinal Investigation (EARLI) and the Markers of Autism Risk in Babies-Learning Early Signs (MARBLES) studies. Metal concentrations were measured in urine collected during pregnancy. We used Bayesian Kernel Machine Regression and linear regression models to investigate both joint and independent associations of metals with SRS Z-scores in each cohort. We adjusted for maternal age at delivery, interpregnancy interval, maternal education, child race/ethnicity, child sex, and/or study site.</p><p><strong>Results: </strong>The final analytic sample consisted of 251 mother-child pairs. When Pb, Hg, Se, and Mn were at their 75th percentiles, there was a 0.03 increase (95% credible interval [CI]: -0.11, 0.17) in EARLI and 0.07 decrease (95% CI: -0.29, 0.15) in MARBLES in childhood SRS Z-scores, compared to when all 4 metals were at their 50th percentiles. In both cohorts, increasing concentrations of Pb were associated with increasing values of SRS Z-scores, fixing the other metals to their 50th percentiles. However, all the 95% credible intervals contained the null.</p><p><strong>Conclusions: </strong>There were no clear monotonic associations between the overall prenatal metal mixture in pregnancy and childhood SRS Z-scores at 36 months. There were also no clear associations between individual metals within this mixture and childhood SRS Z-scores at 36 months. The overall effects of the metal mixture and the individual effects of each metal within this mixture on offspring SRS Z-scores might be heterogeneous across child sex and cohort. Further studies with larger sample sizes are warranted.</p>","PeriodicalId":11827,"journal":{"name":"Environmental Health Insights","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2024-02-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10840406/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139691538","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Liquefied Natural Gas in the Philippines: Clarifications and Interventions for Environmental and Public Health.","authors":"Dalmacito A Cordero","doi":"10.1177/11786302241228957","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/11786302241228957","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":11827,"journal":{"name":"Environmental Health Insights","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2024-02-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10838488/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139680857","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"JN.1: The Present Public Health Concern Pertains to the Emergence of a Novel Variant of COVID-19.","authors":"Sakif Ahamed Khan, Mohiuddin Ahmed Bhuiyan, Syed Masudur Rahman Dewan","doi":"10.1177/11786302241228958","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/11786302241228958","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":11827,"journal":{"name":"Environmental Health Insights","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2024-02-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10832400/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139671464","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}