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Objective: To analyze the clinical features of patients with COVID-19 in Chongqing Municipality. Method(s): The clinical data, laboratory tests and chest imaging findings of 153 patients COVID-19 admitted in Chongqing Public Health Medical Center from January 26 to February 5, 2020 were retrospectively reviewed. According to the relevant diagnostic criteria, patients were divided into non-severe group (n=132) and severe group (n=21). The correlation between serum index changes and disease severity was analyzed. Result(s): The proportion of patients with underlying diabetes or chronic respiratory diseases in severe group was significantly higher than that in non-severe group (chi2=11.04 and 6.94, P<0.05). The proportion of symptom-free patients in non-severe group was significantly higher than that in severe group (chi2=4.09, P<0.05). The symptoms of fever, fatigue and muscle soreness in the severe group were more common than those in the non-severe group (chi2=4.40, 14.42 and 22.67, P<0.05). Among the concomitant symptoms, the proportion of cough and shortness of breath in the severe group was higher than that in the non-severe group (chi2=8.46 and 4.80, P<0.05). C-reactive protein and D-Dimer levels were higher in the severe group than those in the non-severe group (Z=-4.39 and -1.96, P<0.05), and the number of CD3+ T lymphocyte cells, CD4+ T lymphocyte cells and CD8+ T lymphocyte cells in the severe group was lower than that in the non-severe group (Z=27.25, 20.60 and 17.36, P<0.05). Compared with the non-severe group, both lungs and the right lung lower lobe were more susceptible to be involved(chi2=9.7123.61, P<0.05). Conclusion(s): There are significant differences in underlying diseases, clinical symptoms, imaging manifestations and laboratory findings between severe and non-severe patients with COVID-19.Copyright © 2020 by the Chinese Medical Association.
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Background: The 19th meeting of the Conference of the Parties (CoP 19) to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) took place in Panama from the 14th to the 25th of November 2022. The meeting was attended by 2,500 delegates representing more than 160 Parties and observers to the Convention. The COVID-19 pandemic impacted all CITES Parties and significantly disrupted the implementation of CITES. The CoP shared the actions and the experiences of the Parties, the Secretariat, the Committee members and observers in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic. Progress: Delegates reviewed 52 proposed amendments to the Appendices and discussed 91 agenda items. There was the highest proportion of proposals for new Appendix II species but the lowest number of revising annotation proposals the CoP 19 has considered in nearly 25 years. The CoP updated the regulation of international trade in over 600 species of animals and plants. In the adopted proposals, international trade in 50 species of freshwater turtles, 158 species of glass frogs, 100 species of sharks and rays, 150 species of trees and dozens of species of roseroots will be regulated as the newly revised lists are enforced. The CoP adopted the financing and the cost of the programme of work for the triennium 2023‒2025, with an overall budget being 6.1% higher compared to the triennium 2020‒2022. The Conference further refined compliance and enforcement requirements for elephants, big cats, totoaba and other wildlife species threatened with extinction. With the implementations of engagement of indigenous peoples and local communities, livelihoods-related issues have been relatively slow and hampered. Parties vigorously debated proposed amendments to the Rules of Procedure and criteria for the amendments of CITES Appendices, but no substantive amendments were adopted. A pilot version of the World Wildlife Trade Report and the Assessment Report on the Sustainable Use of Wild Species: Policy-Maker Summary were discussed and heard. CITES has added several new topics in the CoP to address new challenges, such as the role of CITES in reducing the risk of future zoonotic diseases associated with the international wildlife trade. The CoP 19 recommends interdisciplinary research to analyze the role of CITES in the conservation and sustainable use of forests. The Parties resolved to work on building gender equality into the international trade in wildlife, recognizing that women are often guardians of wildlife and biodiversity but, just as often, are not recognized or benefit from this trade. Prospects: Regardless of the challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, China's CITES authorities made thorough preparations for the CoP, conducting research two years in advance and drafting a proposal a report which was submitted to the CoP 19, organized pre-session and in-session consultations with scientific authorities, collected information from all parties, and actively led the discussions in working groups, presenting a positive view of China in prioritizing ecological civilization and fulfilling its responsibilities as a major country. CITES will celebrate its 50th anniversary in 2023. The record 365 decisions in CoP 19 demonstrate that CITES Parties continue to take action to address the unprecedented pressures on species due to overexploitation and illegal trade. © 2023, Chinese Academy of Sciences. All rights reserved.
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Background: The 19th meeting of the Conference of the Parties (CoP 19) to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) took place in Panama from the 14th to the 25th of November 2022. The meeting was attended by 2,500 delegates representing more than 160 Parties and observers to the Convention. The COVID-19 pandemic impacted all CITES Parties and significantly disrupted the implementation of CITES. The CoP shared the actions and the experiences of the Parties, the Secretariat, the Committee members and observers in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic. Progress: Delegates reviewed 52 proposed amendments to the Appendices and discussed 91 agenda items. There was the highest proportion of proposals for new Appendix II species but the lowest number of revising annotation proposals the CoP 19 has considered in nearly 25 years. The CoP updated the regulation of international trade in over 600 species of animals and plants. In the adopted proposals, international trade in 50 species of freshwater turtles, 158 species of glass frogs, 100 species of sharks and rays, 150 species of trees and dozens of species of roseroots will be regulated as the newly revised lists are enforced. The CoP adopted the financing and the cost of the programme of work for the triennium 2023‒2025, with an overall budget being 6.1% higher compared to the triennium 2020‒2022. The Conference further refined compliance and enforcement requirements for elephants, big cats, totoaba and other wildlife species threatened with extinction. With the implementations of engagement of indigenous peoples and local communities, livelihoods-related issues have been relatively slow and hampered. Parties vigorously debated proposed amendments to the Rules of Procedure and criteria for the amendments of CITES Appendices, but no substantive amendments were adopted. A pilot version of the World Wildlife Trade Report and the Assessment Report on the Sustainable Use of Wild Species: Policy-Maker Summary were discussed and heard. CITES has added several new topics in the CoP to address new challenges, such as the role of CITES in reducing the risk of future zoonotic diseases associated with the international wildlife trade. The CoP 19 recommends interdisciplinary research to analyze the role of CITES in the conservation and sustainable use of forests. The Parties resolved to work on building gender equality into the international trade in wildlife, recognizing that women are often guardians of wildlife and biodiversity but, just as often, are not recognized or benefit from this trade. Prospects: Regardless of the challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, China's CITES authorities made thorough preparations for the CoP, conducting research two years in advance and drafting a proposal a report which was submitted to the CoP 19, organized pre-session and in-session consultations with scientific authorities, collected information from all parties, and actively led the discussions in working groups, presenting a positive view of China in prioritizing ecological civilization and fulfilling its responsibilities as a major country. CITES will celebrate its 50th anniversary in 2023. The record 365 decisions in CoP 19 demonstrate that CITES Parties continue to take action to address the unprecedented pressures on species due to overexploitation and illegal trade. © 2023, Chinese Academy of Sciences. All rights reserved.
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Objective: To analyze the clinical features of patients with COVID-19 in Chongqing Municipality. Method(s): The clinical data, laboratory tests and chest imaging findings of 153 patients COVID-19 admitted in Chongqing Public Health Medical Center from January 26 to February 5, 2020 were retrospectively reviewed. According to the relevant diagnostic criteria, patients were divided into non-severe group (n=132) and severe group (n=21). The correlation between serum index changes and disease severity was analyzed. Result(s): The proportion of patients with underlying diabetes or chronic respiratory diseases in severe group was significantly higher than that in non-severe group (chi2=11.04 and 6.94, P<0.05). The proportion of symptom-free patients in non-severe group was significantly higher than that in severe group (chi2=4.09, P<0.05). The symptoms of fever, fatigue and muscle soreness in the severe group were more common than those in the non-severe group (chi2=4.40, 14.42 and 22.67, P<0.05). Among the concomitant symptoms, the proportion of cough and shortness of breath in the severe group was higher than that in the non-severe group (chi2=8.46 and 4.80, P<0.05). C-reactive protein and D-Dimer levels were higher in the severe group than those in the non-severe group (Z=-4.39 and -1.96, P<0.05), and the number of CD3+ T lymphocyte cells, CD4+ T lymphocyte cells and CD8+ T lymphocyte cells in the severe group was lower than that in the non-severe group (Z=27.25, 20.60 and 17.36, P<0.05). Compared with the non-severe group, both lungs and the right lung lower lobe were more susceptible to be involved(chi2=9.7123.61, P<0.05). Conclusion(s): There are significant differences in underlying diseases, clinical symptoms, imaging manifestations and laboratory findings between severe and non-severe patients with COVID-19.Copyright © 2020 by the Chinese Medical Association.
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Due to the impact of COVID-19, children and their parents are spending more time at home, which increases parent–child interactions. The goals of the present study were to examine the mediating effects of children's learning engagement on the relationships of parental involvement in Chinese, English, and math performance and to investigate whether parent-perceived parental involvement and child-perceived parental involvement consistently affected children's academic performance. Data were collected from 253 Chinese primary school students (117 boys, Mage = 10.53) during the COVID-19 pandemic. We included parental involvement perceived by the parents and by the children to comprehensively describe parental involvement (in wave 2);we collected children's learning engagement (wave 2);and we compared children's Chinese, English and math academic performances before (wave 1) and after (wave 3) China's first wave of COVID-19 in 2020. The results showed that after controlling for gender, age, and SES, the parental involvement perceived by parents could be directly and positively related to children's learning engagement, and it also indirectly influenced children's learning engagement through the children's perceived parental involvement. Learning engagement was a mediator of the relationship between parental involvement and children's academic performance. Parental involvement significantly predicted children's Chinese and English performances through their learning engagement, while parental involvement failed to predict children's mathematics performances during the COVID-19 pandemic. The current research provides insights into the underlying mechanisms of how parental involvement affects children's academic performances during school closures and hopes to guide parents and schools to consider how to cooperate and continue to use rapidly developing digital education resources amid the long-term impact of COVID-19 to provide children using more effective and suitable guidance in the future. © 2022, Instituto Universitário de Ciências Psicológicas, Sociais e da Vida.
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Multi-object tracking is of great importance in autonomous driving. However, with the outbreak of COVID-19, multi-object tracking faces new challenges in areas gripped by epidemics because of complex motion blur, frequent occlusions, and appearance deformations. To reliably improve object trajectory association in epidemic-plagued areas, we propose a temporal-spatial aggregation embedding network (TSAEN) for multi-object tracking. Our embedding network contains a temporal-aware correlation module (TACM) and spatial-aggregate embedding module (SAEM) that can fully obtain and aggregate appearance clues related to moving objects in previous frames. The TACM learns the temporal homogeneity features of the current and previous frames to perceive features with correlated appearance cues. Then, the SAEM adjusts the spatial deformation for each perceived temporal homogeneity feature and aggregates them for re-ID embedding learning. The experimental results demonstrate that our proposed method is able to achieve excellent overall performance. IEEE
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Background: To examine the outcomes heterogeneity of clinical trial protocols of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) to prioritize the establishment of a core outcome set. Methods: Databases of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors - accepted clinical trial registry platforms were searched on February 14, 2020 and May 31, 2020. Randomized controlled trials and non-randomized controlled trials of COVID-19 were considered. Patient condition was classified as common, severe, or critical. Interventions included traditional Chinese medicine and Western medicine. We excluded trials that involved discharged patients, psychological intervention, and complications of COVID-19. The general information and outcomes, outcome measurement instruments, and measurement times were extracted. The results were analyzed by descriptive analysis. Results: In all, 19 registry platforms were searched. A total of 97 protocols were selected from among 160 protocols for the first search. For protocols of traditional Chinese medicine clinical trials, 76 outcomes from 16 outcome domains were reported, and almost half (34/76, 44.74%) of the outcomes were reported only once;the most frequently reported outcome was time taken for severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 RNA to become negative. Twenty-seven (27/76, 35.53%) outcomes provided one or more outcome measurement instruments. Ten outcomes provided one or more measurement time frame. For protocols of Western medicine clinical trials, 126 outcomes from 17 outcome domains were reported;almost half (62/126, 49.21%) of the outcomes were reported only once;the most frequently reported outcome was proportion of patients with negative severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2. Twenty-seven outcomes provided one or more outcome measurement instruments. Forty (40/126, 31.75%) outcomes provided one or more measurement time frame. There were > 40 duplicated outcomes between the clinical trials protocols of traditional Chinese medicine and western medicine protocols. All of them were included in the Delphi survey when developing core outcome set for COVID-19. A total of 1,027 protocols were selected from 2,741 protocols for the second search. Forty-two new outcomes and 47 new outcome measurement instruments were reported. Conclusion: Outcome reporting in clinical trial protocols of COVID-19 is inconsistent. Thus, establishing a core outcome set is necessary for diagnosis and management.
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Background and Aim: Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is now a worldwide pandemic. Gastrointestinal endoscopy is considered an aerosol-generating procedure (AGP) for severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) transmission. On 25 March 2020, the Prime Minister of Australia announced a nationwide suspension of all non-urgent endoscopy. There are limited data to provide insight into creating a safe model for rationing gastrointestinal endoscopy that does not compromise patient care. Our hospital mobilized a model of care, deferring all non-urgent category 2 and all category 3 cases, and created specific clinics with experienced endoscopists to re-triage outstanding cases. We aimed to conduct a retrospective study to evaluate this single-center experience. Methods: We collected data on patients who had an emergency (performed within 48 h of emergency admission) or elective gastroscopy or colonoscopy during the 5-week lockdown period (26 March to 1 May 2020). For comparison, the same analysis was performed on all those who underwent an endoscopic procedure during the same period 12 months earlier. Our primary objective was to compare the rate of highly significant abnormalities detected during these two periods. Highly significant abnormalities were defined as upper or lower gastrointestinal malignancy, adenomatous polyps larger than 2 cm, or a new diagnosis of inflammatory bowel disease. Furthermore, we evaluated all gastrointestinal malignancy diagnoses over the past 2 years, identifying the triage category, indication, endoscopic and histological findings, and the rate of malignancy diagnosis. Results: During the COVID-19 era, 66% fewer procedures were performed than in the previous year's corresponding period (141 procedures [79% category 1, 21% category 2] vs 410 procedures [45% category 1, 45% category 2, 10% category 3];P < 0.001). The numbers of emergency endoscopies were similar (16 in COVID-19 era vs 18 pre-COVID-19). A comparable number of highly significant abnormalities were found (Table 1). The six new malignancy diagnoses in the COVID-19 era were in keeping with our median monthly cancer rate of 5.5 (IQR, 3-6.3) over the past 2 years. Of the 4621 gastroscopies and 4573 colonoscopies performed in the past 2 years, 94% of the newly diagnosed upper and lower gastrointestinal cancers were triaged as category 1, 6% as category 2, and none as category 3. Conclusion: Our findings suggest that significant and time-critical abnormalities are unlikely to be missed by a model of care prioritizing category 1 and urgent category 2 upper and lower endoscopies, as we did during the COVID-19 shutdown. These reassuring findings may help guide the approach to endoscopy management if another shutdown occurs here or overseas, especially given the recent spike in COVID-19 cases in Victoria.
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OBJECTIVE: The study aimed to explore the effects of psychological intervention on alleviating anxiety in patients in novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV) isolation wards. PATIENTS AND METHODS: Between January 24th, 2020 and March 5th, 2020, 103 patients were studied. Among these, 32 were patients in the isolation ward of the Infectious Disease Department in Baoding Second Hospital with suspected 2019-nCoV, and 71 patients diagnosed with 2019-nCoV were in the Tangshan Infectious Disease Hospital. Of the 103 patients included, 97 cases were observed in isolation. Using a self-control study design, each patient's anxiety was scored on a self-rating anxiety scale before receiving the psychological intervention (on the 7th day of isolation) and after receiving the intervention (on the 14th day of isolation). The severity of anxiety was evaluated based on the anxiety score before receiving the intervention. The anxiety scores before and after receiving the intervention were then compared using the paired t-test, and p<0.05 was considered statistically significant. RESULTS: After receiving the psychological intervention once or twice a week, the anxiety of the patients improved significantly after one week. CONCLUSIONS: The anxiety of patients with 2019-nCoV in isolation wards can be alleviated through psychological intervention. By alleviating patient anxiety, this intervention also helps patients maintain their psychological wellbeing, which promotes rehabilitation and helps with the control of 2019-nCoV.
Subject(s)
Anxiety/prevention & control , COVID-19/psychology , Hospitals, Isolation , Psychosocial Intervention/methods , Quality of Life/psychology , Adaptation, Psychological , Adolescent , Adult , Aged , Aged, 80 and over , Anxiety/psychology , China , Diagnostic Self Evaluation , Female , Humans , Male , Middle Aged , Psychiatric Status Rating Scales , SARS-CoV-2 , Surveys and Questionnaires , Young AdultABSTRACT
Introduction: The present study intends to explore the relationship between anxiety and the educational background of patients in two isolation wards on day 7 of isolation during the epidemic of COVID-19. Materials and methods: Between January 24 and March 5, 2020, 32 patients admitted to the isolation ward of the Infectious Diseases Department of Baoding Second Hospital with suspected COVID-19, and 71 patients in isolation in Tangshan Infectious Disease Hospital with a confirmed diagnosis of COVID-19 were enrolled as the main research subjects, but the actual number of cases analyzed in the present study was 97. Their anxiety was measured by an anxiety scale (SAS scale) on day seven of their isolation. A t-test was used to compare the anxiety score data of the two groups, combined with a scatter plot analysis. P<0.01 was considered statistically significant. Results: There was a total of 97 patients, in two isolation wards, in the study, of whom 47 were male and 50 female. Nineteen of them had a degree above college level, while seventy-eight of them only had a college degree or lower. The results showed that there existed a correlation between the anxiety of patients in isolation during the COVID-19 epidemic and educational background, and that those with a degree above college level were more likely to develop anxiety. Conclusion: During the quarantine period, COVID-19 patients with a degree above college level were more likely to develop anxiety, and the degree of anxiety was more noticeable, while those with a lower level of education were relatively less anxious.
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This paper aims to disclose how the willingness to travel is affected by the risk perception and travellers'familiarity with the destination in a major epidemic. First, a questionnaire was prepared with the commonly used dimensions of traveller risk perception and verified through a preliminary survey. Then, a formal online questionnaire survey was carried out, receiving 860 valid questionnaires. The survey data were subject to analysis based on structural equation model (SEM). The results show that, under COVID-19, the traveller risk perception is negatively correlated with the willingness to travel, and the traveller familiarity with the destination regulated the negative correlation. It also unveils the traveller risk perception is enhanced by the number of changes of transport vehicles, the length of travel time, and the degree of epidemic impact on the destination, but suppressed by the risk tolerance of potential travellers. The main contribution of this research is to introduce risk perception of the particular situation of COVID-19. The research results enrich traveller decision-making mechanism and offer countermeasures to revitalise tourism industry after a major epidemic. © 2020 WITPress. All rights reserved.