Satisfaction with pandemic management and compliance with public health measures: Evidence from a German household survey on the COVID-19 crisis.

We study how satisfaction with government efforts to respond to the COVID-19 crisis affects compliance with pandemic mitigation measures. Using a novel longitudinal household survey for Germany, we overcome the identification and endogeneity challenges involved in estimating individual compliance by using an instrumental variable approach that exploits exogenous variation in two indicators measured before the crisis: political party preferences and the mode of information measured by the frequency of using social media and reading newspapers. We find that a one unit increase in subjective satisfaction (on the 0-10 scale) improves protective behavior by 2-4 percentage points. Satisfaction with the government's COVID-19 management is lower among individuals with right-wing partisan preferences and among individuals who use only social media as an information source. Overall, our results indicate that the effectiveness of uniform policy measures in various domains, such as the health system, social security or taxation, especially during pandemic crises, cannot be fully evaluated without taking individual preferences for collective action into account.

Evaluating major anthropogenic VOC emission sources in densely populated Vietnamese cities.

Volatile organic compounds (VOCs) play an important role in urban air pollution, both as primary pollutants and through their contribution to the formation of secondary pollutants, such as tropospheric ozone and secondary organic aerosols. In this study, more than 30 VOC species were continuously monitored in the two most populous cities in Vietnam, namely Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC, September-October 2018 and March 2019) and Hanoi (March 2019). In parallel with ambient VOC sampling, grab sampling was used to target the most prevalent regional-specific emission sources and estimate their emission factors (EFs). Emission ratios (ERs) obtained from ambient sampling were compared between Vietnamese cities and other cities across the globe. No significant differences were observed between HCMC and Hanoi, suggesting the presence of similar sources. Moreover, a good global agreement was obtained in the spatial comparison within a factor of 2, with greater ER for aromatics and pentanes obtained in the Vietnamese cities. The detailed analysis of sources included the evaluation of EF from passenger cars, buses, trucks, motorcycles, 3-wheeled motorcycles, waste burning, and coal-burning emissions. Our comparisons between ambient and near-source concentration profiles show that road transport sources are the main contributors to VOC concentrations in Vietnamese cities. VOC emissions were calculated from measured EF and consumption data available in Hanoi and compared with those estimated by a global emission inventory (EDGAR v4.3.2). The total VOC emissions from the road transport sector estimated by the inventory do not agree with those calculated from our observations which showed higher total emissions by a factor of 3. Furthermore, the inventory misrepresented the VOCs speciation, mainly for isoprene, monoterpenes, aromatics, and oxygenated compounds. Accounting for these differences in regional air quality models would lead to improved predictions of their impacts and help to prioritise pollution reduction strategies in the region.

Source of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in rainwater and effect on the health of the population: the case of the District of Abidjan in the South of Ivory Coast.

Rainwater pollution in urban areas is a real phenomenon globally, particularly in developing countries. This study aims to trace the origin of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in the Abidjan district's rainwater and to evaluate the health risk to the population. Ten water samples were collected at two sites during the dry and rainy seasons over a 2-year period. The use of molecular indices and profiles as well as Spearman's correlation matrix revealed that the pyrolytic sources, such as wood combustion as well as road traffic, remain the main sources of these pollutants in the water. The risk assessment revealed a higher risk of skin cancer in children.

Natives' Attitudes and Immigrants' Unemployment Durations.

In this study, we investigate how the attitude of natives-defined as the perceived trustworthiness of citizens from different countries-affects immigrants' labor market outcomes in Germany. Evidence in the literature suggests that barriers to economic assimilation might be higher for some groups of immigrants, but the role of natives' heterogeneous attitudes toward immigrants from different countries of origin has received little attention. Using individual-level panel data from the German Socio-Economic Panel covering the years 1984 to 2014, we apply survival analysis methods to model immigrants' unemployment durations. We find that lower levels of trust expressed by natives toward the citizens of a given country, measured using Eurobarometer surveys, are associated with increased unemployment durations for immigrants from this country. We show that this result is not driven by origin-specific unobserved heterogeneity and that it is robust to different specifications and alternative explanations.

Management of diabetes in Guinean traditional medicine: an ethnobotanical investigation in the coastal lowlands.

ETHNOPHARMACOLOGICAL RELEVANCE: This survey was carried out in the coastal lowlands of Guinea-Conakry in order to make an inventory of plants used by traditional healers, herbalists and diabetic patients for the management of diabetes mellitus. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Frequent ethnomedical and ethnobotanical investigations were conducted from June 2008 to December 2009 in Conakry, Kindia, Forécariah, Dubréka, Boke, Fria and Boffa. It is a cross-sectional survey and data collection is based on the interactive method. During this period a total of 112 people aged from 39 to 76 years old were interviewed. RESULTS: During this investigation 146 plant species belonging to 55 families were collected. The most cited plants were Anacardium occidentale L. and Ficus spp., while the Fabaceae family was the most represented, followed by the Euphorbiaceae and Rubiaceae. The most frequently plant parts used by the traditional healers and the herbalists were the stem-bark and decoctions the most common preparation mode. CONCLUSIONS: It is clear that a variety of plants is used in the management and treatment of diabetes. Due to the increasing prevalence of type 2 diabetes, there is an urgent need for scientific investigations to rationalise the use of these traditional remedies, which could represent accessible alternative medicines for the Guinean populations.