ABSTRACT
The Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome-associated Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) was an outbreak in December, 2019 and rapidly spread to the world. All variants of SARS-CoV-2, including the globally and currently dominant Delta variant (Delta-SARS-CoV-2), caused severe disease and mortality. Among all variants, Delta-SARS-CoV-2 had the highest transmissibility, growth rate, and secondary attack rate than other variants except for the new variant of Omicron that still exists with many unknown effects. In Taiwan, the pandemic Delta-SARS-CoV-2 began in Pingtung from 14 June 2021 and ceased at 11 July 2021. Seventeen patients were infected by Delta-SARS-CoV-2 and 1 person died during the Pingtung outbreak. The Public Health Bureau of Pingtung County Government stopped the Delta-SARS-CoV-2 outbreak within 1 month through measures such as epidemic investigation, rapid gene sequencing, rapidly expanding isolation, expanded screening of the Delta-SARS-CoV-2 antigen for people who lived in regional villages, and indirect intervention, including rapid vaccination, short lockdown period, and travel restrictions. Indirect environmental factors, such as low levels of air pollution, tropic weather in the summer season, and rural areas might have accelerated the ability to control the Delta-SARS-CoV-2 spread. This successful experience might be recommended as a successful formula for the unvaccinated or insufficiently vaccinated regions.
Subject(s)
COVID-19 , Communicable Disease Control , Disease Outbreaks , Humans , SARS-CoV-2 , Taiwan/epidemiologyABSTRACT
In recent years, lectures on control systems have focused on hands-on experience using actual control equipment than before. However, the online education triggered compulsorily by the Covid-19 pandemic poses has restricted the construction of an education environment for hands-on experience. In this study, we proposed an economical and compact experimental environment for control education that enables hands-on experience even through online education. To this end, we utilized a light weight rapid control prototyping (LW-RCP), which is a lab-built RCP environment, and the environment was constructed using 3D printing. In the proposed environment, LW-RCP enabled students to focus on the learning and application of related control concepts, without the inconvenience of manual C-coding and the possibility of debugging errors. In addition, the proposed control equipment, which was manufactured using 3D printing, is an inexpensive equipment with a sufficiently small size that can be placed on a desk. Owing to the low cost and small size of the proposed environment, each student can have his/her own experimental equipment, which will enable a hands-on experience even through online education. Online education is expected to expand more and more in the future as it exhibits various advantages and potentials from traditional face-to-face classes. The proposed educational environment is expected to play a meaningful role in satisfying the demands of hands-on experience for control-related lectures. © ICROS 2021.