Insights into the Positive Role of a Higher Education Institution in the Prevention of Misinformation During Pandemics: The Health Committee Model During COVID-19

In Lebanon, with COVID-19 cases escalating and national efforts exhausted in the contain-ment of the pandemic, calls were made for increased awareness, scientific literacy, and the debunking of false information. This article sheds light on the positive role that a private University can play in spreading scientifically-authenticated, health-related, awareness through the community. The Lebanese International University (LIU) has 9 campuses distributed across all Lebanese Governorates with an extensive communications platform that takes advantage of LIU's website, University Management Sys-tem, several Facebook pages with thousands of followers, and many WhatsApp groups. LIU has over 34,000 undergraduate and graduate students, in addition to a little over a thousand faculty and staff members. The University capitalized on this extensive network to play a positive role in delivering authenticated health-related information to the University's greater community. A health committee comprised of multidisciplinary educators, mostly from the fields of medicine and health sciences, was established to act as a health advisory panel to the University Council and to raise awareness among the University's larger community. An extensive health awareness campaign was launched through activities and the sharing of the material of different formats aimed at providing accurate information on infection prevention, and disseminating authentic and accurate health-related guidelines and recommendations during the pandemic. This compendium aims to summarize the role of the health committee in meeting the various challenges created by the emergence of COVID-19 in our community, and highlights its influence and future perspectives.Copyright © 2021 Bentham Science Publishers.

The epidemiological characteristics coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in Halabja Province/Kurdistan -Iraq

The new highly transmitted pathogenic viral infection started from Wuhan, China at the end of 2019. The World Health Organization publicized that it is phylogenetically belonging to severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), introduced as COVID-19 pandemic disease, and spread around the world. The first confirmed case in Kurdistan region was on 1st of March, 2020. While the first COVID-19 case in Halabja province/Kurdistan region was recorded on 27th of March, 2020. This study was designed, when the Wafa Hospital constructed in Halabja/Kurdistan region for infected patients. The data were collected from 14th April to the end of December, 2020 and included name and age of the infected persons. Samples were obtained nasopharyngeal using a sterilized swab following WHO guidelines and then the real time PCR (RT-PCR) machine was used for analysis. This study was particularly representing the impact of COVID-19 on suspected person. It was focused on the susceptibility of suspected cases in Halabja province, according to ages and sexes. During the study, 5183 cases were tested, 2796 (54%) cases were confirmed as positive result and 2387 (46%) cases were negative, including all ages, males and females. Confirmed male cases among 3116 cases were 1646 (60.1%), and 1150 (39.9%) positive cases recorded among 2067 female tests. In addition, the ages of the tested cases were divided into 10 sub-groups (0-9) years old to (90-99) years old, subsequently. The result of this study for both sexes, revealed that, the most confirmed cases among (30-39) years group and (40-49) years group were (1521) and (1223) confirmed positive cases. The lowest cases were among over 80 years old and below 9 years old (10, 3) confirmed cases. Besides, the confirmed cases for other age groups for both sexes were (50-59) years old was 397, (60-69) years old was 205, (70-79) was 77. Finally, the data showed that, the common confirmed cases were among groups 20-59 years old and the rare cases were under 9 and over 80 years.

Current Potential Options for COVID-19 Treatment in Iraq- Kurdistan Region and the Rest of the World: A Mini-review

COVID-19 is an infectious pandemic disease which is caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2). Up to date, scientists are trying to identify a new specific antiviral drug to overcome this disease. Different methods are under study and evaluation in the entire world to control the virus, including blood plasma, blood purification, and antimicrobial and antiviral agents;however, there are no approved drugs yet. This review is focused on the conducted clinical trials worldwide, including the Iraq- Kurdistan region, China, USA, and Europe, to find relevant data on the agents with potential efficacy to treat the COVID-19 infection. The utmost commonly assessed therapies for this disease were chloroquine phosphate, hydroxyl-chloroquine, azithromycin, lopinavir/ritonavir, favipiravir, remdesivir, and alternatively, blood plasma, ivermectin in combination with doxycycline, and dexamethazone. This review suggests that blood plasma transfusion, the combination of hydroxyl-chloroquine with azithromycin, and remdesivir were the most abundant and efficient therapies. Thus, more light could be shed on these particular drugs on the road of drug investigation against COVID-19 pneumonia. © 2022 University of Baghdad-College of Science. All rights reserved.

Spatiotemporal Integration of Tuberculosis and COVID-19 during the COVID-19 Pandemic in Libya. (preprint)

Tuberculosis and COVID-19 infections have been traced in Libya during the first 28 epi-weeks and spatiotemporal analysis was carried to determine the patterns of the concurrence of these infections. The data indicated that despite the slight decline in TB notification, the two infections are intertwined and showed synergetic spatiotemporal patterns which vary geographically during the pandemic period. Adequate integrated interventions policy to contain the two co-occurring infections should be considered