Effect of the Changing Climate and Urban Ecology on Spreading of Infectious Diseases Including SARS-CoV-2

Globalisation, industrialisation, and ease of international travel are making a huge impact on urban ecology. It is also influencing the climate, exaggerated by increased pollution, global temperature, and greenhouse gasses. All these factors together play a pivotal role in the increased emergence of infectious human diseases like fungal, bacterial, and viral. Many microorganisms are commensal and coâ€exist as microflora of healthy individuals. However, when the immune system is compromised due to disruption of mucosal barriers or presence of other environmental factors including increased air pollution, these microorganisms get an opportunity to invade and cause infections. In a similar way, the ongoing COVIDâ€19 pandemic, mediated by SARSâ€CoVâ€2, has also led to an increase in a number of nosocomial infections and secondary infections or superinfections like bacterial, fungal, and viral. Several studies have suggested that adaptation to higher temperatures is one of the key contributors to the emergence of many fungus like Candida auris and mucormycetes. Even bacteria like Acinetobacter baumannii, Mycobacterium tuberculosis, etc. or viral infections mediated by Ebola, H1N1, Encephalitis, and SARSâ€CoVâ€2 become more virulent with change in climate and urban ecology. Lifestyle change including uncontrolled intake of animal foods which possibly resulted in the zoonotic transfer of SARSâ€CoVâ€2 to humans, an increase in sexually transmitted diseases including AIDS due to uncontrolled lifestyles in a modern urban society are few other examples. Although these are the results of humans’ need and greed, it is not too late to take actions towards sustainable developments and adopting preventive plans to save the future world. This chapter mainly attempts to understand how such changes in environmental factors, altered climate, and urban ecology can lead to emergence of several infectious diseases, followed by a discussion of preventive measures to keep a steady but sustainable global development of human lives. © 2022 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Name Entity Recognition on Covid-19 Dataset using Machine Learning algorithms

The COVID-19 pandemic has been accompanied by such an explosive increase in media coverage and scientific publications that researchers find it difficult to keep up. So we are working on COVID-19 dataset on Omicron variant to recognise the name entity from a given text. We collect the COVID related data from newspaper or from tweets. This article covered the name entity like COVID variant name, organization name and location name, vaccine name. It include tokenisation, POS tagging, Chunking, levelling, editing and for run the program. It will help us to recognise the name entity like where the COVID spread (location) most, which variant spread most (variant name), which vaccine has been given (vaccine name) from huge dataset. In this work, we have identified the names. If we assume unemployment, economic downfall, death, recovery, depression, as a topic we can identify the topic names also, and in which phase it occurred. © 2022 IEEE.

The only option? Distance learning in North India during the COVID-19 pandemic

During the COVID-19 pandemic, most Indian schools were closed for nearly two years, despite extensive evidence showing most children could not access online learning. In our interviews with those affected by school closures in North India, teachers and parents who could access online learning described it as ‘the only option'. This aligns with the dominant framing of EdTech, both nationally and globally, as a positive and inevitable feature of learning futures. However, parents who could not access online learning stressed that it was not an option for them and called for in-person learning to resume. Although several alternatives to online learning were available, and all interviewees described some of these, for many this did not dislodge the idea that online learning was ‘the only option'. This marginalisation of alternatives is a form of ‘technological inevitabilism' that facilitated a lack of urgency in reopening schools and a widening of education inequities. © 2023 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.

THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC MAY HAVE EXACERBATED NURSE STAFFING DISPARITIES IN NURSING FACILITIES

Nursing facilities (NFs) have historically struggled to maintain adequate nurse staffing. We used PBJ data linked with other publicly available sources and conducted stakeholder interviews to understand nurse staffing between 2019 and 2020. We found large declines in the population of NF residents and in staffing hours. Measured in hours per resident day (HPRD) to account for the size of the NF resident population, there were slight increases in staffing. Staffing was nonetheless a major challenge for NFs because they required increased staffing due to the impact of the pandemic. NFs in higher quartiles of percentage of minority residents lost nurse staffing HPRD relative to NFs in the lowest quartile of minority residents. Stakeholders explained that NFs with more minority residents were likely to employ staff who live in more vulnerable communities with a greater concentration of minorities, who were more impacted by COVID.

ASSESSING THE FACTORS ASSOCIATED WITH NURSING HOME CLOSURES

The media has reported recent increases in nursing home closures. This study examined closures from 2011-2019, identified facility and market characteristics associated with closures, and assessed the impact of closures on quality and access. We identified closures using termination dates and gaps in certification surveys and conducted descriptive and multivariate analysis. We identified 1,220 closures, with large increases in closure rates in 2018 and 2019 and geographic clusters. Chain facilities, urban facilities and smaller facilities were more likely to close, as were facilities with higher percentages of non-white and Medicaid residents. Staffing and quality five-star ratings had a nonlinear relationship with closure, which suggests Medicaid funding may impact closures rates. We found both the number of beds per 1,000 elderly and occupancy rates decreased, including in high-quality facilities. Closures should be examined further in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Multi-criteria Decision Making and Its Application to Online Learning Platform Selection During the COVID-19 Pandemic Based on TOPSIS Method

The COVID-19 outbreak has made a huge impact across the nation. It really has caused damage on the education system, as governments across the world partially or completely shutting down educational institutions to combat the transmission of the deadly virus. Classroom teachings have been made obsolete by online classes, leading to a rise of web-based learning, which has sure to meet the students to continue their studies. Students, teachers, administrations, and education professionals have experience gathered of significant challenges as a result of the abrupt shift from classroom teaching to web-based learning. As a result, Learning Management Systems (LMS) and Virtual Learning Environments (VLE) have become widely more popular and attractive, especially as a result of the pandemic's forced educational adjustments. In a web-based learning system, search engines have been found applicable to continue the educational process. Also, the search engines are involved with retrieving necessary documentation (images, text, video, web pages, and so on) from a large database in order to respond to the learner's request and several online platforms have been made with different features and facilities viz. Zoom, Google Meet, Google Classroom, Microsoft Teams, Cisco Webex, GoTo Meet, skype, etc. In this chapter, we have been applied TOPSIS method for selecting suitable online platform from existing online platforms using Multi-Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) technique. Finally, to illustrate the proposed technique, a realistic scenario for selecting the online platform from a web-based learning system has been exhibited. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.

Telecardiology COVID-19 cryptographic system: Security reinforcement through metaheuristics and artificial neural networks

In this critical phase of COVID-19, cryptographic and nature-inspired innovations help communicate confidential data inside electronic telehealth systems. The novel corona virus has shattered all formats of life. In medical sciences, patients are advised to opt for remote-based telemedicine support. Cardiac patients are highly susceptible to corona virus. It is highly recommended that patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary diseases (COPDs) as comorbidity stay safe at their remote quarantines. Through such telecardiology systems, they may transmit and communicate their critical and secret information related to multiple cardiac reports to different stakeholders for better treatments, views, and expert opinions. This will reduce their chances of contracting COVID-19 due to no physical movements outside their homes. Such heterogeneous cardiac-related reports are to be secured with a view to restore the patients’ confidentiality clause. Cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) are a type of disease related to the blockage of arteries and veins. Patients suffering from CVDs require proper diagnosis and treatment by cardiologists. Contemporary flaws in a patient's private information are a significant and open challenge in such telecardiology systems. Electronic cardio records are extremely sensitive in nature. Hence, it is very important to impose an advanced security technique in such COVID-19 systems. In this chapter, we have developed a cryptographic system based on a metaheuristic harmony search algorithm and an artificial neural network. This system acts against different security conducts in communication networks, especially during this COVID-19 period when online medical transactions have increased tremendously. The proposed technique has been categorized into three components, namely metaheuristic session key generation, transitional key generation, and new encryption. For the high cryptographic scheme, two proposed set of keys have been used, namely, the session key and the transitional key. The session key has been generated by metaheuristics and artificial neural perceptrons. A novel secret sharing has been proposed on patients’ data with lower complexities. To achieve better nonlinearity in encryption, linear and nonlinear functions have also been incorporated in this technique. A rigorous frame structure has been added before message transmission inside the COVID-19 telecardiology system. Different types of statistical and mathematical tests have been carried out on the proposed technique to prove its efficacy. Security analysis has also been conducted to nullify the efforts of tricksters and external intruders. Thus, the proposed cryptographic system acts as a reinforcement of security mechanism in COVID-19 telecardiology. © 2022 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

COVID-19 paediatric cavity telecare system: a novel chain key generation and encryption scheme

In this unprecedented coronavirus crisis, telehealth had emerged as a substitute way of treatment. More specifically, paediatric children are at high risk of outside exposure now. Non critical children must be treated remotely through the tableware system. A key based secured online transmission of an intraoral image of the paediatric cavity has been proposed in this manuscript. A cavity is a dental disease occurring in children. It is mainly caused due to prolonged bacterial infections. Secured online transmission with respect to medical transactions is immensely required in telecare information systems (TIS). Data confidentiality factor is preserved with preference in this proposed technique. A parity based novel chain key (NCK) has been generated and diffused inside the intraoral paediatric cavity image. NCK generation scheme is so highly robust that it gives different combinations after each bit altering. Initial seeds are kept at the dentist and patients, to resist myriad attacks inside the wireless channel, especially during this COVID-19 period. Histogram, floating frequency, and autocorrelation were obtained with accuracy using the proposed technique. Effects were observed by flipping simultaneous bits of the initial key and results were highly acceptable. The time for the proposed key generation has been found to be 514.61 ms. The total cryptographic time has been noted as 3.5983 ms in this technique. © 2022, Institute of Advanced Engineering and Science. All rights reserved.

A systematic review on the efficacies and therapeutic interventions of homoeopathic medicines in combating viral disorders with implications in the currently undergoing homoeopathic treatment efforts for SARS-CoV-2 infection (COVID-19)

The prevalence of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome-Corona Virus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) has undergone a historic transition from December 2019 to June 2020. Under the current circumstances, SARS-CoV-2 has become a key problem for the public health and economic steadiness of the global fraternity. Based on ample evidences from the global epidemiology of SARS-CoV-2 and MERS-CoV (Middle East Respiratory Syndrome-Corona virus) scientists and physicians strappingly consider these viruses share structural and functional similarities of selected biologically active enzymes namely, 3CLpro, PLpro and RdRp. Ultra-diluted homoeopathic medicine has the legacy to combat infectious as well as viral diseases since last two centuries. Thus, a systematic review on existing antiviral homoeopathic therapies was done in the current study and the need of appropriate clinical validation with proper in vitro as well as in vivo studies prior to make clinical endorsements in treating COVID-19 patients with homoeopathic medicines has been explained. A brief summary of the currently undergoing or recently completed homoeopathic treatments of COVID-19 has also been provided to attract many more similar homoeopathic treatment attempts to combat COVID-19. © International Journal of High Dilution Research.