ABSTRACT
The Tianjin Biosecurity Guidelines for Codes of Conduct for Scientists are a set of ten principles designed to promote responsible science and strengthen biosecurity governance. They should be broadly adopted, including being endorsed by the Biological Weapons Convention at its 9th Review Conference in November 2022.
Subject(s)
Biological Warfare Agents , BiosecurityABSTRACT
Emergent infectious diseases represent a real threat to global health, but their harmful effects can be reduced by implementing appropriate response policies. According to the panel data of 10 provinces in Northern China from 2009 to 2018, the disease prevention and control policy jointly implemented in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region in 2013 was regarded as a 'quasi-natural experiment'. However, this policy has not yet been sufficiently evaluated. In this paper, we used the difference-in-difference method to quantitatively evaluate the net effects of applying the joint prevention and control policy against regional key notifiable infectious diseases. The results revealed that the joint disease prevention and control policy had a significant limiting effect and a time lag on the incidence rate of key infectious diseases. In conclusion, this policy is beneficial to the effective prevention and control of infectious diseases, which provides supporting evidence to interpret and improve the joint disease prevention and control mechanisms.
Subject(s)
Joint Diseases , Policy , Beijing , China , Humans , IncidenceABSTRACT
BACKGROUND: Human genetic resources are an important material component for life science research and have strategic significance for medical science and technological innovation. In this study, we employ frameworks from social psychology and the science of human behavior to study human genetic resource providers. AIMS: We used structural equation techniques to explain factors affecting the intention to provide human genetic resources and the mechanisms for providing such resources. METHODS: We conducted an online survey with respondents from ethnic minorities (n = 912). Our model integrates key variables informed by the theory of planned behavior (TPB), the theory of benefit and risk assessment (BRA), as well as variables that represent the policy and political system. RESULTS: Our results show that the factors affecting the intention to provide human genetic resources, ranked from highly influential to less influential, are perceived benefits, privacy risk, attitudes toward providing human genetic resources, perceived behavioral efficacy, psychological risk, subjective norms, and physical risk. The variables informed by the TPB all have a significant positive effect on the intention to provide human genetic resources. With the exception of physical risk, the variables informed by the theory of BRA have a significant effect on the intention to provide human genetic resources. Respondents with different health conditions have significantly different levels of physical risk. CONCLUSIONS: The results of our study provide insights into how to improve people's intention to provide human genetic resources. We also proposed ways to protect such resources globally.