ABSTRACT
COVID-19 pandemic impacted the behaviour of travellers. While worldwide, overall emissions decreased during the lockdown, shared mobility options may be perceived as less safe in a post-pandemic reality, leading to increased emissions due to expanded individual transportation. In particular, intercity trips entail numerous environmental impacts, such as emissions. The main objective of this paper is to assess how intercity corridors' emissions vary when travel behaviour of the population changes following a pandemic. Based on a macroscopic modelling framework, the methodology consisted of three main phases: data collection, traffic modelling and emission modelling. Different scenarios related to the impact of the pandemic were developed, and their impacts were analysed using several key performance indicators related to CO2 NOx emissions and travel time. Findings suggest that reducing the average number of occupants per vehicle reduces emissions, which do not increase linearly with the number of vehicles. Compared with the baseline scenario (occupancy rate of 1.30), the most extreme scenario (occupancy rate of 1.00) may result in an increase in both CO2 and NOx emissions by approximately 30%. These results highlight the importance of making public transport and carpooling not only safe but also safe as perceived by users.
ABSTRACT
This report from ASCO's International Quality Steering Group summarizes early learnings on how the COVID-19 pandemic and its stresses have disproportionately affected cancer care delivery and its delivery systems across the world. This article shares perspectives from eight different countries, including Austria, Brazil, Ghana, Honduras, Ireland, the Philippines, South Africa, and the United Arab Emirates, which provide insight to their unique issues, challenges, and barriers to quality improvement in cancer care during the pandemic. These perspectives shed light on some key recommendations applicable on a global scale and focus on access to care, importance of expanding and developing new treatments for both COVID-19 and cancer, access to telemedicine, collecting and using COVID-19 and cancer registry data, establishing measures and guidelines to further enhance quality of care, and expanding communication among governments, health care systems, and health care providers. The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on cancer care and quality improvement has been and will continue to be felt across the globe, but this report aims to share these experiences and learnings and to assist ASCO's international members and our global fight against the pandemic and cancer.