ABSTRACT
Aim: Assessing impacts of Covid-19 infection in Medical Oncology patients in a highly vaccinated population at a Western Australian hospital post opening of state borders. Method(s): Patients with Covid-19 RAT positivity were prospectively identified between March and May 2022 by treating clinicians. Electronic case notes and pathology records were reviewed for data collection. Outcomes assessed included treatment delays and mortality. Result(s): Thirty-six patientswere identified with solid organ malignancy and RAT positive Covid-19 infection of whom 64% (23) were female. The median age was 57.5 years. 81% (29) had metastatic disease and the most predominant subtype was breast cancer (42%). 81% (29) were on active therapy with 55% on chemotherapy (31% chemotherapy alone). 78% of the patients had received at least two doses of Covid-19 vaccination, with 53% having had at least one booster. 8% were unvaccinated. 78% were community acquired infections versus 22% acquired during a hospital admission. 67% (24) patients were symptomatic at detection, with symptom severity ranging from mild to moderate, with 8% patients needing oxygen for desaturation. 64% were managed as outpatients. A total of 58% received antiviral therapy (14% IV Remdesevir and 86% oral with Molnupiravir (44%) and Paxlovid (50%)) of which 90% completed their course. 90% of those receiving antivirals were on active therapy. Treatment delays were observed in 83% (24/29) of patients with a median delay of 2 weeks. Two deaths were partially attributed to Covid-19 infection in inpatients with disease progression and concurrent bacterial sepsis. Both these patients were double vaccinated and on chemotherapy. No deaths were solely attributed to Covid-19. Conclusion(s): The overall outcomes in this population of WA Oncology patients from Covid-19 infection remained favourable with low mortality despite symptomatic infection requiring antiviral therapy and treatment delays.
ABSTRACT
School canteen is one of the indispensable educational resources and plays an important role in one’s school life. As the school canteen supplies on average of a third of a student’s daily food consumption, it has a great influence on student health and nutrition. This means the school canteen plays an important role in instilling healthy eating culture among the students. Besides that, school canteen should also consider food allergy issue as the allergic reaction is unpredictable. In addition, the outbreak of pandemic COVID-19 has changed the normal practice of a school canteen. The class teachers are assigned to manually take food orders from the students or the parents. This has drastically increased the teachers’ workload. In view of these concerns, an Android-based mobile application is designed and developed to facilitate the food ordering process in the school canteen with food allergy alert feature. This can ease a class teacher’s workload and helps the school authorities to manage the school canteen especially during the recess time. It also provides a communication channel between the school canteen caterer and parents for food ordering and allergy-causing food information. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.
ABSTRACT
School pickup is a daily routine for most parents during the school term. The use of private vehicles as daily commute to transport students to and from schools has caused school-related traffic congestion and air pollution problems. The after school waiting bay of most schools in urban areas is normally very crowded with students waiting for transport to travel home. Teachers on duty and school student council members are assigned to monitor and control the crowded situation. Some schools implement drive-thru pickup procedure in which the teacher on duty need to be very attentive and observe the cars approaching the bay for pickup in order to queue up the students at the pickup bay. With the outbreak of pandemic COVID-19, the teachers not only need to observe the vehicles heading to the pickup bay but to ensure the students obey social distancing norms. To alleviate after school pickup related problems, a mobile application for after school pickup is proposed. With this application, the school teachers would be able to obtain a list of pickup requests from the parents via the mobile application and queue up the students accordingly with safe social distancing at the pickup bay. This can ease the crowded situation, minimize parents’ waiting time at the pickup lane, and reduce air pollution problem caused by vehicle engines that are running while waiting at the pickup lane. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.
ABSTRACT
This paper develops econometric models to estimate the impact of social media on e-commerce sales, pre- and post-COVID. We use data from 2009 to 2021 on 21 major types of social media to develop our models and divide our data into four time frames: (1) 2009-2014, (2) 2015-2020, (3) 2009 to 2020, and (4) 2020-2021 (post-COVID). The models will also allow us to compare pre- and post-COVID impact of social media on e-commerce. We expect that the impact of each type of social media platform would differ based upon the above four time frames, and that that some social media platforms would prove to be more effective than others at a specific time frame. This paper concludes with our expected results, along with a discussion of the limitations of social media usage on e-commerce. © 2021 IEEE.