Assessing the effectiveness of a community intervention for monkeypox prevention in the Congo basin

Background

In areas where health resources are limited, community participation in the recognition and reporting of disease hazards is critical for the identification of outbreaks. This is particularly true for zoonotic diseases such as monkeypox that principally affect people living in remote areas with few health services. Here we report the findings of an evaluation measuring the effectiveness of a film-based community outreach program designed to improve the understanding of monkeypox symptoms, transmission and prevention, by residents of the Republic of the Congo (ROC) who are at risk for disease acquisition.

Methodology/Principal Findings

During 90 days, monkeypox outreach was conducted for ∼23,860 people in northern ROC. Two hundred seventy-one attendees (selected via a structured sample) were interviewed before and after participating in a small-group outreach session. The proportion of interviewees demonstrating monkeypox-specific knowledge before and after was compared. Significant gains were measured in areas of disease recognition, transmission, and mitigation of risk. The ability to recognize at least one disease symptom and a willingness to take a family member with monkeypox to the hospital increased from 49 and 45% to 95 and 87%, respectively (p<0.001, both). Willingness to deter behaviors associated with zoonotic risk, such as eating the carcass of a primate found dead in the forest, remained fundamentally unchanged however, suggesting additional messaging may be needed.

Conclusions/Significance

These results suggest that our current program of film-based educational activities is effective in improving disease-specific knowledge and may encourage individuals to seek out the advice of health workers when monkeypox is suspected.     

Ecological monitoring to support Water Sharing Plan evaluation and protect wetlands of inland New South Wales,Australia

Government‐funded flow response monitoring and modelling programmes (flow science) provided by the New South Wales Office of Water (NOW) have supported water resource management since 1997. Flow science has a core technical component defined by hypothesis‐driven long‐term monitoring and analysis, but it also represents many activities that support committees involved in environmental flow management. This is done through collaborations and contracting and has fostered considerable research and analysis into flow ecology, including modelling for the recent Murray–Darling Basin Plan. We describe the performance of environmental flows against legislated wetland objectives to improve wetland function and diversity using flow science. On‐ground monitoring at wetland sites has largely ceased but the flow science done so far indicates that the environmental flow rules written into Water Sharing Plans improve wetland diversity and function. Determination of the long‐term flow needs of NSW wetlands, including how well current Water Sharing Plans aid the delivery of environmental flows, requires finding the means to build on current flow science knowledge from across Australia.     

Transversus abdominis activation during a side-bridge exercise progression is similar in people with recurrent low back pain and healthy controls

ABSTRACT: Himes, MA, Selkow, NM, Gore, MA, Hart, JM, Saliba, SA. Transversus abdominis activation during a side-bridge exercise progression is similar in people with recurrent low back pain and healthy controls. J Strength Cond Res 26(11): 3106-3112, 2012-Low back pain (LBP) affects 70-80% of the population. The transversus abdominis (TrA) has been implicated as part of the cause of LBP. Prevention and rehabilitation of LBP often target the TrA using exercises such as the side bridge accompanied with the abdominal drawing-in maneuver (ADIM). However, it is unknown whether individuals with recurrent LBP, when they are in a period of no pain, are able to activate the TrA and healthy individuals during this exercise. The purpose of our study was to compare the activation ratio of the TrA during a 5-level side-bridge exercise progression. Twenty-three subjects with a history of recurrent, nonspecific LBP, but not experiencing an exacerbation of symptoms and 24 healthy controls volunteered. All the subjects performed the ADIM and side-bridge exercises with clinician feedback (verbal cueing). Each participant performed the side-bridge exercise progression while ultrasound images were taken. The subjects were only progressed if they successfully completed the previous level. The thickness of the TrA was measured in rested and contracted states at each exercise level to find the activation ratio (TrA contracted/TrA rest). Separate analyses of covariance did not reveal a difference in activation ratios between groups (p > 0.40) when the ratio at the lowest level was used as the covariate. The results from this study indicate that both groups were able to contract the TrA with verbal cueing during a side-bridge exercise progression. Because the TrA contracted similarly during exercise in both groups, the association of LBP with the TrA may be because of another mechanism, such as delayed activation in the feed-forward mechanism during activity or a lack of endurance of the TrA.     

Biodiversity of the bacterial flora on the surface of a smear cheese

The bacteria on the surface of a farmhouse smear-ripened cheese at four stages of ripening (4, 16, 23, and 37 days) from inoculated (i.e., deliberately inoculated with Brevibacterium linens BL2) and noninoculated (not deliberately inoculated with B. linens BL2) cheese were investigated. The results show that, contrary to accepted belief, B. linens is not a significant member of the surface flora of smear cheese and no microbial succession of species occurred during the ripening of the cheeses. Of 400 isolates made, 390 were lactate-utilizing coryneforms and 10 were coagulase-negative Staphylococcus spp. A detailed analysis of the coryneforms was undertaken using phenotypic analysis, molecular fingerprinting, chemotaxonomic techniques, and 16S rRNA gene sequencing. DNA banding profiles (ramdom amplified polymorphic DNA [RAPD]-PCR) of all the coryneform isolates showed large numbers of clusters. However, pulsed-field gel electrophoresis (PFGE) of the isolates from the cheeses showed that all isolates within a cluster and in many contiguous clusters were the same. The inoculated and noninoculated cheeses were dominated by single clones of novel species of Corynebacterium casei (50.2% of isolates), Corynebacterium mooreparkense (26% of isolates), and Microbacterium gubbeenense (12.8% of isolates). In addition, five of the isolates from the inoculated cheese were Corynebacterium flavescens. Thirty-seven strains were not identified but many had similar PFGE patterns, indicating that they were the same species. C. mooreparkense and C. casei grew at pH values below 4.9 in the presence of 8% NaCl, while M. gubbeenense did not grow below pH 5.8 in the presence of 5 to 10% NaCl. B. linens BL2 was not recovered from the inoculated cheese because it was inhibited by all the Staphylococcus isolates and many of the coryneforms. It was concluded that within a particular batch of cheese there was significant bacterial diversity in the microflora on the surface.     

The Duration of a Co-Occurring Sound Modulates Visual Detection Performance in Humans

Background

The duration of sounds can affect the perceived duration of co-occurring visual stimuli. However, it is unclear whether this is limited to amodal processes of duration perception or affects other non-temporal qualities of visual perception.

Methodology/Principal Findings

Here, we tested the hypothesis that visual sensitivity - rather than only the perceived duration of visual stimuli - can be affected by the duration of co-occurring sounds. We found that visual detection sensitivity (d’) for unimodal stimuli was higher for stimuli of longer duration. Crucially, in a cross-modal condition, we replicated previous unimodal findings, observing that visual sensitivity was shaped by the duration of co-occurring sounds. When short visual stimuli (∼24 ms) were accompanied by sounds of matching duration, visual sensitivity was decreased relative to the unimodal visual condition. However, when the same visual stimuli were accompanied by longer auditory stimuli (∼60–96 ms), visual sensitivity was increased relative to the performance for ∼24 ms auditory stimuli. Across participants, this sensitivity enhancement was observed within a critical time window of ∼60–96 ms. Moreover, the amplitude of this effect correlated with visual sensitivity enhancement found for longer lasting visual stimuli across participants.

Conclusions/Significance

Our findings show that the duration of co-occurring sounds affects visual perception; it changes visual sensitivity in a similar way as altering the (actual) duration of the visual stimuli does.