ABSTRACT
During the COVID-19 epidemic, blood samples are usually processed at 56 to attenuate the virus before pathogen detection. 71 blood samples of malaria patients reported by Shanghai Center for Disease Control and Prevention in 2017-2019 were collected, including 38 with Plasmodium falciparum infection, 8 P. malariae, 11 P. ovale and 14 P. vivax. The effect of inactivation on the thermal stability of P. falciparum histidine rich protein II (PfHRPII) and Plasmodium lactate dehydrogenase (pLDH) in blood samples was assessed before and after incubation at 56 for 30 min using the rapid diagnostic test (RDT) kit. The results showed that among the 38 P. falciparum T1-positive (PfHRPII) blood samples before heat treatment, 35 samples remained to be T1-positive (92.11%, 35/38, chi2=3.123, P>0.05) after heat treatment;while 54 blood samples (26 P. falciparum, 6 P. vivax, 10 P. ovale and 12 P. vivax) that were T2-positive (pLDH) before heat treatment turned to be T2-negative (positive rate 0, 0/54, chi2=87.755, P<0.01) after heat treatment. It was demonstrated that PfHRPII is stable during incubation at 56 for 30 min, while pLDH is unstable and degraded or inactivated during the heating. Therefore, the detection results of P. falciparum will not be affected by RDT, but diagnosis of the parasites other than P. falciparum in blood samples may be missed.Copyright © 2021, National Institute of Parasitic Diseases. All rights reserved.
ABSTRACT
Objective To assess the case-based malaria surveillance and response during the period of COVID-19 outbreak in China, in order to provide reference for malaria elimination under the COVID-19 pandemic. Methods Information of malaria cases reported during the four months pre - and post-COVID -19 outbreak (December 1, 2019-March 31, 2020) and in the same time period of past two years in China (excluding Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan regions) was obtained from the Parasitic Disease Control Information Management System. Cross-sectional survey and comparison were conducted for malaria surveillance and response data in 3 four-month time periods (December 1, 2019 to January 22, 2020;January 23 to March 17, 2020;and March 18-31, 2020). The number of malaria cases including deaths, the median and average time interval from disease onset to the first visit, the median and average of time interval from the first visit to the confirmed diagnosis, the completion status of the #1-3-7$ task and the source of infections in each period were analyzed and compared to the same times in the past two years. Results From December 1, 2019 to March 31, 2020, a total of 750 malaria cases, which were all imported cases, were reported in China, decreased by 9.2% from that reported during December 2018 and March 2019 (826 cases) and by 13.1% from that reported during December 2017 to March 2018 (863 cases). The decrease mainly occurred in February and March in 2020;there were no statistical differences in the time interval from onset to first visit (median 1 day, mean 2.0 days), time interval from first visit to confirmed diagnosis (median 1 day, mean 1.8 days), case reporting rate within 1 day (100%), case epidemiological investigation rate within 3 days (98.4%), epidemic site disposal rate within 7 days (100%) between the time period of COVID-19 outbreak and the same time in the past year (December 2018 to March 2019). In addition, no statistical difference (! > 0.05) was found in the time intervals from onset to first visit among the first period [median 1 d, average (1.9 +/- 0.2) d], the second period [median 1 d, average (2.1 +/- 0.3) d] and the third period [median 1 d, mean (1.5 +/- 0.3) d], while the time interval from the first visit to the confirmed diagnosis was statistically different (! X 0.05) among the first period [median 0 d, average (1.5 +/- 0.2) d], the second period [median 1 d, mean (2.3 +/- 0.3) d] and the third period [median 0.5 d, average (1.5 +/- 0.4) d], where the time interval in the second period was longer than that in the first period (! X 0.01). Conclusion China' s core measures to eliminate malaria have been carried out as planned, although the timely malaria diagnosis was slightly affected in the second time period (January 23 to March 17, 2020).Copyright © 2021, National Institute of Parasitic Diseases. All rights reserved.
ABSTRACT
As Covid-19 plagues the world, a clean environment helps to control the factors and risks that threaten health, and curb the spread of the epidemic. However, the quality evaluation of environmental health faces some problems and challenges in actual management and practice. Firstly, the classification, identification, and quantification of road garbage are mainly done manually, because of the diversity of road garbage, as well as their sharp differences in geometry, color, and texture. Secondly, it is labor-intensive to manually manage the large operation areas on the wide urban roads. Thirdly, the accuracy of statistical indices is affected by the time-varying road environment, making the quality evaluation of environmental health untimely and inaccurate. To solve these problems, this paper proposes an intelligent image classification and evaluation method for urban environmental health. Specifically, an environmental garbage recognition and semantic segmentation approach was designed based on UNet++, and combined with the vehicle-mounted machine vision system to automatically identify the typical targets among the road waste control indices. Next, an image attention quantitative evaluation method was developed based on the eye tracking analyzer, and the quantified attention was fused with the statistical features for road garbage classification, forming an attention-based evaluation method for environmental quality. The proposed approach supports the automatic recognition and semantic segmentation of the garbage on urban roads, and realizes the identification of complex targets in different scenes through transfer learning. In addition, the attention-based evaluation method for environmental quality provides environmental management departments with visual basis for quantitative decision-making.
ABSTRACT
Despite the fact that our cognition towards infectious disease prevention, the advanced technology and the economic status of the whole society has made a great progress in the last decade, the outbreak of COVID-19 pneumonia has again enabled the public to acquire more about super-challenges of infectious diseases, epidemics and the relevant preventive measurements. In order to identify the epidemic signals in early stage or even before the onset of epidemic, the data research and utilization of a series of factors related to the occurrence and transmission of infectious diseases have played a significant role in research of prevention and control during the whole period of surveillance and early warning. Laboratory-based monitoring for the etiology has always been an important part of infectious disease warning system due to pathogens as the direct cause of such diseases. China has initially established a laboratory-based monitoring and early warning system for bacterial infectious diseases based on the Chinese Pathogen Identification Network with an aim to identify pathogens, outbreaks and sources. This network has played an essential role in early detection, tracking and precise prevention and control of bacterial infectious diseases, such as plague, cholera, and epidemic cerebrospinal meningitis. This issue focuses on the function of laboratory-based monitoring during the period of early warning, prevention, and control of bacterial infectious diseases, and conducted a wide range of researches based on the analysis of the epidemic and outbreak isolates, together with field epidemiological studies and normal monitoring systems. All of these could illustrate the effect of laboratory surveillance in the infectious disease risk assessment and epidemic investigation. At the same time, we have put forward our review and expectation of scenarios about laboratory-based monitoring and early warning technologies to provide innovative thoughts for promoting a leapfrog development of infectious disease monitoring and early warning system in China.
Subject(s)
Bacterial Infections , COVID-19 , Communicable Diseases , Epidemics , Bacterial Infections/epidemiology , Communicable Diseases/epidemiology , Disease Outbreaks/prevention & control , Humans , LaboratoriesABSTRACT
During the COVID-19 epidemic, blood samples are usually processed at 56 ℃ to attenuate the virus before pathogen detection. 71 blood samples of malaria patients reported by Shanghai Center for Disease Control and Prevention in 2017-2019 were collected, including 38 with Plasmodium falciparum infection, 8 P. malariae, 11 P. ovale and 14 P. vivax. The effect of inactivation on the thermal stability of P. falciparum histidine rich protein Ⅱ (PfHRPⅡ) and Plasmodium lactate dehydrogenase (pLDH) in blood samples was assessed before and after incubation at 56 ℃ for 30 min using the rapid diagnostic test (RDT) kit. The results showed that among the 38 P. falciparum T1-positive (PfHRPⅡ) blood samples before heat treatment, 35 samples remained to be T1-positive (92.11%, 35/38, χ2=3.123, P>0.05) after heat treatment;while 54 blood samples (26 P. falciparum, 6 P. vivax, 10 P. ovale and 12 P. vivax) that were T2-positive (pLDH) before heat treatment turned to be T2-negative (positive rate 0, 0/54, χ2=87.755, P<0.01) after heat treatment. It was demonstrated that PfHRPⅡ is stable during incubation at 56 ℃ for 30 min, while pLDH is unstable and degraded or inactivated during the heating. Therefore, the detection results of P. falciparum will not be affected by RDT, but diagnosis of the parasites other than P. falciparum in blood samples may be missed. © 2021, National Institute of Parasitic Diseases. All rights reserved.