Consumption of Household Disinfectants during the COVID-19 Pandemic in Sorsogon, Philippines

Knowledge of behavior and perception changes about the use of household disinfectants in the Philippines during the COVID-19 pandemic is largely unexplored. Through a survey, we took into consideration the locals' responses from Sorsogon, Philippines. Alcohol and oxidizing agents were found to be the most commonly used household disinfectant products in Sorsogon. Most of the respondents have shifted to the everyday use of disinfectant products during the pandemic. Increased disinfectant consumerism was positively associated with genders, employed respondents, and students but not among housewives and non-employed respondents. Most of the respondents agreed that various factors are needed to consider when choosing disinfectants. They were also knowledgeable about the possible effects of disinfectant wastes on the environment. How would these collective positive behavior changes during the new normal era warrant further attention. [ FROM AUTHOR] Copyright of Philippine Journal of Science is the property of Science & Technology Information Institute and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full . (Copyright applies to all s.)

Risk assessment using information entropy

Risk assessment, particularly when using simulations, requires that the analyst develops estimates of expected, low, and high values for inputs. Mean and standard deviation are often used to assess the variability of metrics, assuming that the underlying distribution is normal. However, it is increasingly realized that non-normal distributions are common and important. If data are available, it is simple and straightforward to check this assumption by computing higher order moments.Claude Shannon [1], [2] proposed that the information entropy for a set of N discrete events can be measured by (Formula Presented) E. T. Jaynes [3] proposed that, if data is available, information entropy can be maximized using Lagrangian multipliers and that the resulting probability distribution maximizes the uncertainty of that distribution given the data.In order to use entropy maximization, it is required to define constraints such that Σpi = 1, plus constraints on the mean, variance, skew, kurtosis, and other moments. This problem does not have a closed form solution but can be solved iteratively in a spreadsheet.The problem can be set up as follows for mean bar x and variance s2: (Formula Presented) This basic formulation models the normal distribution. The importance of non-normality can be estimated by adding higher order moments as desired. For n ≥ 3, constraints can be added using: (Formula Presented) where Mn is the computed nth moment of the data set.Differentiating ∂H/∂pi = 0 maximizes information entropy, and the resulting probability distribution has the most uncertainty given the observed data.This suggests that it is possible to develop an estimate of the distribution where some values are underrepresented in the sample. It further suggests that unusual or atypical results can be better estimated.This paper uses the method of maximizing entropy to model observed data and will study two time series applications. One problem of interest is sequential acquisition of data. For example, time to failure for a device may be a metric of concern. A maximum entropy model provides an empirical estimate of the distribution of this metric. A second problem of interest is forecasting the distribution of a metric at some point in the future. This applies to supply chain management. Project sponsors prepare cost and schedule estimates well in advance of placing the orders for the materials used in those projects. Management reserves for cost and schedule are typically set by subject matter experts, and recent experience (e.g., supply chain disruptions due to the COVID19 pandemic) may overemphasize current data when developing risk assessments. This approach offers a datadriven way to empirically develop risk assessments. © 2023 IEEE.