COVID-19 vaccination intent and willingness to pay in Bangladesh: a cross-sectional study (preprint)

Aim: This article reports the intent to receive a COVID-19 vaccine, its predictors and willingness to pay in Bangladesh. Subject and Methods: We did a cross-sectional survey of 697 adults in January 2021. A structured questionnaire was used to assess vaccination intent. Questionnaire included potential socio-demographic variables and health belief model constructs which may predict vaccination intent. Results: : Among the participants, 25.5% demonstrated a definite intent, 43% probable intent, 24% probable negative, and 7.5% a definite negative intention. Multivariable logistic regression analyses suggest association between definite intent and previous COVID-19 infection (OR: 2.86; 95% CI: 1.71 – 4.78), perceiving COVID-19 as serious (OR: 1.93; 1.04 – 3.59), the belief that vaccination would make them feel less worried about COVID-19 (OR: 4.42; 2.25 – 8.68), and concerns about vaccine affordability (OR: 1.51; 1.01 – 2.25). Individuals afraid of the side effects (OR: 0.34; 0.21 – 0.53) and would take the vaccine if the vaccine were taken by many in public (OR: 0.44; 0.29 – 0.67) are less likely to have a definite intent. A definite negative intent is associated with the concern that the vaccine may not be halal (OR: 2.03; 1.04 – 3.96). 68.4% are willing to pay for vaccine. The median amount they are willing to pay is $7.08. Conclusion: Adequate monitoring to stop the spreading of misinformation, and further research work to understand challenges in making a new vaccine acceptable by the population are needed.

Trust Concerns in Health Apps collecting Personally Identifiable Information during COVID-19-like Zoonosis (preprint)

Coronavirus disease 2019, or COVID-19 in short, is a zoonosis, i.e., a disease that spreads from animals to humans. Due to its highly epizootic nature, it has compelled the public health experts to deploy smartphone applications to trace its rapid transmission pattern along with the infected persons as well by utilizing the persons' personally identifiable information. However, these information may summon several undesirable provocations towards the technical experts in terms of privacy and cyber security, particularly the trust concerns. If not resolved by now, the circumstances will affect the mass level population through inadequate usage of the health applications in the smartphones and thus liberate the forgery of a catastrophe for another COVID-19-like zoonosis to come. Therefore, an extensive study was required to address this severe issue. This paper has fulfilled the study mentioned above needed by not only discussing the recently designed and developed health applications all over the regions around the world but also investigating their usefulness and limitations. The trust defiance is identified as well as scrutinized from the viewpoint of an end-user. Several recommendations are suggested in the later part of this paper to leverage awareness among the ordinary individuals.

Real-time credible online health information inquiring: a novel search engine misinformation notifier extension (SEMiNExt) during COVID-19-like disease outbreak (preprint)

Public health-related misinformation spread rapidly in online networks, particularly, in social media during any disease outbreak. Misinformation of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) drug protocol or presentation of its treatment from untrusted sources have shown dramatic consequences on public health. Authorities are utilizing several surveillance tools to detect, and slow down the rapid misinformation spread online, still millions of misinformation are found online. However, there is no currently available tool for receiving real-time misinformation notification during online health or COVID-19 related inquiries. Our proposed novel combinational approach, where we have integrated machine learning techniques with novel search engine misinformation notifier extension (SEMiNExt), helps to understand which news or information is from unreliable sources in real-time. The extension filters the search results and shows notification beforehand; it is a new and unexplored approach to prevent the spread of misinformation. To validate the user query, SEMiNExt transfers the data to a machine learning algorithm or classifier which predicts the authenticity of the search inquiry and sends a binary decision as either true or false. The results show that the supervised learning algorithm works best when 80% of the data set have been used for training purpose. Also, 10-fold cross-validation demonstrate a maximum accuracy and F1-score of 84.3% and 84.1% respectively for the Decision Tree classifier while the K-nearest-neighbor (KNN) algorithm shows the least performance. The SEMiNExt approach has introduced the possibility to improve online health communication system by showing misinformation notifications in real-time which enables safer web-based searching while inquiring on health-related issues.

Oral Health of the Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh and the COVID-19 Pandemic (preprint)

Approximately a million Rohingya refugees from the Rakhine State, Myanmar is residing at refugee camps in Cox’s Bazar district of Bangladesh. Whereas maintaining the general health and hygiene of these refugees residing in the densely-crowded camps are highly challenging, maintaining their oral health is often neglected. Angiotensin-converting enzyme II (ACE-2) receptors play an essential role in spreading the COVID-19. Hence, it is present in the oral cavity, predominantly in the tongue, and oral mucosa may predispose to infection with 2019-nCoV. Here, we have highlighted the importance of regular monitoring and improving the oral health of the Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh and how it may contribute to preventive measures in spreading this highly contagious disease.

Exploring the knowledge, awareness and practices of COVID-19 among dentists in Bangladesh: A Cross-sectional Investigation (preprint)

Aim: This study aims to assess the knowledge, awareness, and practices of registered dentists regarding COVID-19 epidemiology and transmission during the rapid outbreak of this highly contagious virus in Bangladesh. Subjects and Methods: A cross-sectional web-based survey was conducted among the dentists who were enrolled with their valid unique Bangladesh Medical and Dental Council (BMDC) registration number. A validated questionnaire was developed and distributed among the dentists by using different social media platforms. A total of 184 dentists participated in the survey between March and April 2020.   Both descriptive analysis logistic regression analysis was performed.Results: The mean age of the dentists is 31.75 years, with a standard deviation of 6.5 years. About 29.3% of dentists completed their postgraduate qualification, and 76% of them are engaged in private practice. The dentists who completed postgraduate education are three times more likely to know (OR=3.1, 95%CI 1.2-7.9) about COVID-19 compared to the dentists who completed an undergraduate degree. It is also observed that the dentists who are employed in private and independent settings are four times (OR=4, 95%CI 0.7-24) more likely to follow safe practice compared to the dentists who are engaged in the government hospitals or clinics.Conclusion: The dentists from Bangladesh have shown good knowledge, awareness, and practice regarding COVID-19. We recommend that the healthcare authorities, professional organizations, and hospitals coordinate, and conduct mandatory advanced infectious disease training for all the practicing dentists in the country.

Overview of digital health surveillance system during COVID-19 pandemic: public health issues and misapprehensions (preprint)

Without proper medication and vaccination for the COVID-19, many governments are using automated digital healthcare surveillance system to prevent and control the spread. There is not enough literature explaining the concerns and privacy issues; hence, we have briefly explained the topics in this paper. We focused on digital healthcare surveillance system's privacy concerns and different segments. Further research studies should be conducted in different sectors. This paper provides an overview based on the published articles, which are not focusing on the privacy issues that much. Artificial intelligence and 5G networks combine the advanced digital healthcare surveillance system; whereas Bluetooth-based contact tracing systems have fewer privacy concerns. More studies are required to find the appropriate digital healthcare surveillance system, which would be ideal for monitoring, controlling, and predicting the COVID-19 trajectory.

Digital Surveillance Systems for Tracing COVID-19: Privacy and Security Challenges with Recommendations (preprint)

Coronavirus disease 2019, i.e. COVID-19 has imposed the public health measure of keeping social distancing for preventing mass transmission of COVID-19. For monitoring the social distancing and keeping the trace of transmission, we are obligated to develop various types of digital surveillance systems, which include contact tracing systems and drone-based monitoring systems. Due to the inconvenience of manual labor, traditional contact tracing systems are gradually replaced by the efficient automated contact tracing applications that are developed for smartphones. However, the commencement of automated contact tracing applications introduces the inevitable privacy and security challenges. Nevertheless, unawareness and/or lack of smartphone usage among mass people lead to drone-based monitoring systems. These systems also invite unwelcomed privacy and security challenges. This paper discusses the recently designed and developed digital surveillance system applications with their protocols deployed in several countries around the world. Their privacy and security challenges are discussed as well as analyzed from the viewpoint of privacy acts. Several recommendations are suggested separately for automated contact tracing systems and drone-based monitoring systems, which could further be explored and implemented afterwards to prevent any possible privacy violation and protect an unsuspecting person from any potential cyber attack.