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The coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic disrupted all surgical specialties significantly and exerted additional pressures on the overburdened United Kingdom (UK) National Health Service. Healthcare professionals in the UK have had to adapt their practice. In particular, surgeons have faced organisational and technical challenges treating patients who carried higher risks, were more urgent and could not wait for prehabilitation or optimisation before their intervention. Furthermore, there were implications for blood transfusion with uncertain patterns of demand, reductions in donations and loss of crucial staff because of sickness and public health restrictions. Previous guidelines have attempted to address the control of bleeding and its consequences after cardiothoracic surgery, but there have been no targeted recommendations in light of the recent COVID-19 challenges. In this context, and with a focus on the perioperative period, an expert multidisciplinary Task Force reviewed the impact of bleeding in cardiothoracic surgery, explored different aspects of patient blood management with a focus on the use of haemostats as adjuncts to conventional surgical techniques and proposed best practice recommendations in the UK. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the last three years, numerous research papers have been reported which use social media data to explore several issues related to the COVID-19 pandemic. Bibliometric methods in this work are used to analyze 1427 peer-reviewed documents from the last three years extracted from the Web of Science database. The results of this study show that there was high growth in publications in open access journals with an annual rate reaching 19.3% and they also identify the top cited journals and research papers. The thematic analysis of papers shows that research topics related to social media for surveillance and monitoring of public attitudes and perceptions, mental health, misinformation, and fake news are important and well-developed, whereas topics related to distance-learning education with social media are emerging. The results also show that the USA, China, and the UK have published many papers and received a high number of citations because of their strong international collaboration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the experiences and perceptions of Zora, an older Muslim woman living with a disability in the UK. Older disabled Muslim women in the UK often face multiple discriminations based on disability, age, gender, religious, and racial grounds and this has arguably been intensified by the COVID-19 pandemic. Drawing on multiple narrative interviews with Zora, this paper focuses on the intersections of disability, ageing, gender, race and religion within a particular social context during the COVID-19 pandemic in the UK. The paper describes the complex ways in which Zora experienced various modes of everyday disablism which were not related to the COVID-19 virus itself, rather the consequences of the movement restrictions associated with it. Much of the oppression and barriers she described were socially determined, both through direct discrimination, stares and prejudicial attitudes, and indirectly through stigmatization and an embodied fear of the reaction of others in public spaces. Nevertheless, Zora did not present herself as a victim. Instead she portrayed herself in affirmative terms, as a 'brave' woman who resisted and overcame daily social challenges and movement restrictions as part of working toward creating a more accessible, inclusive and age-friendly society. One that is inhabitable for herself and other older disabled women facing an uncertain future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This perspective paper begins with discussing how COVID-19 magnified the prepandemic 'bare life' conditions which exposed older people's lives to risks and indignities in the health and social care system. Then, by using the concept of Necropolitics, the life and death decisions, based on age as a proxy measure for population health during the pandemic, are discussed. This discussion includes examples of 'exceptional' practices that were implemented in the UK during the first wave, including 'Do Not Resuscitate' orders, unsafe hospital discharges, not transferring to hospitals, and denying access to treatment for older people. It then goes on to renew the call for a feminist care ethic to be central to the ways in which our future health and social care systems are configured. Arguing for the need to politically reframe ageing, health and social care provision towards a radical alternative system that rethinks care relations and addresses inequality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: The COVID-19 pandemic has caused untold damage to the socio-economic lives of people all over the world. Research has also demonstrated great inequality in the pandemic experience. In the UK as in many other countries, people from ethnic minority backgrounds and in workingclass positions have suffered disproportionately more than the majority group and those in salariat positions in terms of income loss, financial difficulty, and vulnerability to infection. Yet little is known about how people coped in the daily lives and tried to maintain their well-being during the most difficult days of the pandemic through social capital. Methods: In this paper, we draw data from the COVID-19 Survey in Five National Longitudinal Studies to address these questions. The survey covered the period from May 2020 to February 2021, the height of the pandemic in the UK. It contains numerous questions on contact, help and support among family, friends, community members, socio-political trust, and physical and mental health. We conceptualise three types of social capital and one type of overall well-being and we construct latent variables from categorical indicator variables. We analyse the ethnic and socio-economic determinants of the three types of social capital and their impacts on well-being. Results: Our analysis shows that social capital plays very important roles on wellbeing, and that ethnic minority groups, particularly those of Pakistani/Bangladeshi and Black heritages, faced multiple disadvantages: their poorer socio-economic positions prevented them from gaining similar levels of social capital to those of the white group. However, for people with the same levels of social capital, the effects on well-being are generally similar. Discussion: Socio-economic (class) inequality is the root cause for ethnic differences in social capital which in turn affects people's well-being. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study utilises the ‘natural experiment’ of COVID-19 to explore how disruption affected individuals’ perceptions and experiences of cycling, through semistructured interviews with eight cycle-shop owners and 30 residents in the Liverpool City Region, UK. It provides an account of the rapidly changing conditions that helped to support greater participation in cycling. Primarily this was due to reduced conflict between cyclists and others for road space. This was supported, though less significantly, by the provision of temporary cycling infrastructure as well as diminished competition for an individual’s time and energy from alternative leisure activities which were outlawed through COVID-19-related regulations. By disrupting car-dominated environments, the change in infrastructure and reduction in traffic flows contributed towards reducing the skills and confidence required to begin cycling. Nevertheless, as traffic rebounded to pre-pandemic volumes it was evident that the opportunity offered by disruption failed to be fully realised within the region. Despite this, the period has illustrated the potential for broader participation in cycling, though the paper finds that significant disruption to the infrastructures and traffic flows within the urban environment is required if a long-term modal shift is to occur following the surge in participation in cycling observed during the COVID-19 pandemic. To do so, the paper identifies several interventions that can be implemented to imitate the disruption observed in our study, and in doing so support a transition towards a low-carbon mobility system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated pre-existing challenges faced by academic staff in UK higher education and drawn attention to issues of Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion (EDI). Amidst global competitiveness and workplace pressures, challenges such as managerialism, increased workload, and inequalities have worsened, significantly impactingmental health. This paper presents a conceptual analysis connecting EDI with organizational compassion within the context of Higher Education. The prioritization of organizational compassion is presented as a means to enhance sensitivity to EDI in the reconstruction of post-pandemic learning environments. Anchored in the organizational compassion theory and the NEAR Mechanisms Model, our study contributes to the intersection of the organizational compassion, EDI and higher education literatures by exploring how fostering compassion relations can contribute to enhancing EDI. This offers a new perspective to creating a more humane and supportive higher education environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a UK-based group of female postgraduate researchers, the authors explored their experiences during COVID-19 pandemic through multivocal inquiry via a feminist collaborative autoethnographic project. In this paper, we use the Listening Guide as a tool to revisit and (re)analyse data from the aforementioned project, displaying findings in the form of voice poems. In utilising the Listening Guide, we discovered that listening is less of an exercise and more an art form. While the structured approach of the LG helped to enhance our understandings of wider individual experiences of disability and womanhood, identities that all authors inhabit, we were surprised to find that despite our established mutual trust and superficially similar experiences, we were unable to find emotional resonance through data that wasn't our own voice. We also found that the traditional stepped process of the LG that incorporates four listens to the data left our interpretations feeling flat. Through reflexivity and the novel collaborative approach we undertook in this analysis, we identified and implemented an augmentation of the Listening Guide process. In this paper, we propose an additional fifth listen, focusing on emotion, to facilitate a more holistic analysis of voice data. We explore how the fifth listen assisted the (re)construction of individual and collective identities, helping us to reshape our understandings. Finally, we elucidate the positives and pitfalls we experienced in the Listening Guide as a data analysis tool, recommending to other researchers the adoption of an iterative, flexible and reflexive approach in using it during collaborative research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The COVID-19 pandemic has affected how clinical trials are managed, both within existing portfolios and for the rapidly developed COVID-19 trials. Sponsors or delegated organisations responsible for monitoring trials have needed to consider and implement alternative ways of working due to the national infection risk necessitating restricted movement of staff and public, reduced clinical staff resource as research staff moved to clinical areas, and amended working arrangements for sponsor and sponsor delegates as staff moved to working from home.Organisations have often worked in isolation to fast track mitigations required for the conduct of clinical trials during the pandemic; this paper describes many of the learnings from a group of monitoring leads based in United Kingdom Clinical Research Collaboration (UKCRC) Clinical Trials Unit (CTUs) within the UK.The UKCRC Monitoring Task and Finish Group, comprising monitoring leads from 9 CTUs, met repeatedly to identify how COVID-19 had affected clinical trial monitoring. Informed consent is included as a specific issue within this paper, as review of completed consent documentation is often required within trial monitoring plans (TMPs). Monitoring is defined as involving on-site monitoring, central monitoring or/and remote monitoring.Monitoring, required to protect the safety of the patients and the integrity of the trial and ensure the protocol is followed, is often best done by a combination of central, remote and on-site monitoring. However, if on-site monitoring is not possible, workable solutions can be found using only central or central and remote monitoring. eConsent, consent by a third person, or via remote means is plausible. Minimising datasets to the critical data reduces workload for sites and CTU staff. Home working caused by COVID-19 has made electronic trial master files (TMFs) more inviting. Allowing sites to book and attend protocol training at a time convenient to them has been successful and worth pursuing for trials with many sites in the future.The arrival of COVID-19 in the UK has forced consideration of and changes to how clinical trials are conducted in relation to monitoring. Some developed practices will be useful in other pandemics and others should be incorporated into regular use. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In early 2020 a wide range of social and economic restrictions were implemented in most countries in response to the global coronavirus pandemic (Covid-19). This paper uses national electricity generation data to examine the extent to which overall British electricity consumption deviated from 'normal' consumption patterns during the UK's spring lockdown period, and how the combination of consumption reduction and variation in carbon intensity affected greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) associated with electricity consumption. The paper shows that ongoing trends in the reduction of electricity demand and generation carbon intensity mean that lower year-on-year demand and lower emissions would have been expected even in the absence of Covid-19. Controlling for this, the paper estimates lockdowndriven below-trend electricity reductions of up to 20% in the morning peak period, 11% in the daytime and 9% in the evening peak period in April, declining to 6%, 4% and 4%, respectively, by June. These correspond to marked reductions in morning (06:00-08:00 hours) and daytime demand during all restriction periods studied, but relatively smaller reductions in evening demand, and some evidence of a relative increase on Friday and Saturday evenings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes and analyses the response of UK civil society in the early months of the Covid-19 crisis, roughly the period March to July 2020. While focussing primarily on civil society actors, the paper includes an exploration of how civil society and the national government interacted with each other. It considers the extent to which responses to the Covid-19 crisis reflect familiar patterns of behaviour by civil society in the UK, and in the relationship between the government and 'third sector'. The paper concludes by pointing to emergent issues for civil society as the UK looked towards recovery from the initial wave of crisis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper documents that a large-scale government subsidy aimed at encouraging people to eat out in restaurants in the wake of the first 2020 COVID-19 wave in the United Kingdom has had a significant causal impact on new cases, accelerating the subsequent second COVID-19 wave. The scheme subsidised 50% off the cost of food and non-alcoholic drinks for an unlimited number of visits in participating restaurants on Mondays–Wednesdays from 3–31 August 2020. Areas with higher take-up saw both a notable increase in new COVID-19 infection clusters within a week of the scheme starting and a deceleration in infections within two weeks of the program ending. Similarly, areas that exhibited notable rainfall during the prime lunch and dinner hours on the days the scheme was active record lower infection incidence—a pattern that is also measurable in mobility data—and non-detectable on days during which the discount was not available or for rainfall outside the core lunch and dinner hours. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The aim of this paper is to examine the changed nature of public accountability during a supreme emergency and explore how legal and auditing mechanisms have come to the fore, concluding that misappropriation of public monies is not an inevitable outcome. Design/methodology/approach: The paper explores an illustrative example, the UK government's procurement of personal protective equipment during the early stages of the Covid-19 pandemic. Findings: In circumstances of a supreme emergency where parliamentary scrutiny and competitive contract tendering are suspended, other forms of public accountability come to the fore, with civil society actors becoming more evident. Research limitations/implications: The paper relies on illustrative examples based on the Westminster model of government. The study advanced the notion of deferred accountability and identifies areas for further study, potentially in different jurisdictions. Social implications: The paper highlights the need for a variety of active and engaged civil society actors. Originality/value: The paper contributes an empirical case to how an account of government behaviour is established. The paper also contributes to a deeper understanding of the nature and role of legal and government audit accountability mechanisms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Community-based volunteering supports outbreak management by extending reach into at-risk communities. This paper examines the application of a 'community champions' model in England, UK, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Evidence pre-pandemic shows that community champion interventions tap into social networks to strengthen connections with disadvantaged communities. During the pandemic, the UK government set up a COVID community champions funding award scheme for local authorities to develop local programmes that addressed emerging inequalities. The study aim was to identify transferable learning on community engagement in the pandemic by undertaking a secondary qualitative synthesis of practice-based case studies of local COVID community champion programmes. Methods: A systematic staged approach for synthesis of practice-based case studies was used. In total, 16 COVID community champion case studies, which were written by practitioners involved in local programme implementation and published by the Local Government Association, were included. Case studies covered aims, programme development and delivery, examples of activities and a discussion of learning. Framework qualitative analysis methods were used to code and organise data prior to cross case analysis. The final stage produced an overarching thematic framework that best represented descriptive and interpretive themes. Results: The results provide an overview of common features of COVID community champion programmes and emergent learning. All local programmes aimed to reduce health inequalities by involving at-risk communities in local prevention efforts, adapting the approach to local priorities. Two levels of community engagement were volunteer mobilisation and subsequent community-based outreach activities. Elements of capacity building, such as training and creation of networks, were common. The synthesis of practice-based learning found that stronger relationships with communities were regarded as a key mechanism to support more equitable prevention strategies. Other learning themes related to champion roles, community engagement strategies and programme implementation. Conclusions: By focusing on how community champion approaches were applied by local authorities in England during the COVID-19 pandemic, this study contributes to knowledge on volunteer mobilisation as a mechanism to improve public health communication and outreach. Notwithstanding the limitations of experiential evidence, the synthesis of practice-based learning highlights potentially transferable community engagement strategies for health protection and health improvement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The COVID-19 pandemic has had far-reaching effects, not only on public health but also on the global economy, social interactions, and daily life. It has highlighted the importance of global cooperation and the need for more investment in public health and emergency preparedness. The pandemic also exposed weaknesses in many countries' educational management systems; it has forced many higher education institutions to adopt new teaching and learning methods to minimize the risk of transmission. This resulted in the need for comparative studies to evaluate the effectiveness of different pedagogical responses and to find common ground on the most effective practices and responses that would help higher education institutions better prepare for similar challenges in the future. The present study provides a comparative study and outcomes through a record of the pedagogical responses by higher education authorities in two completely different contexts (Algeria and the UK). The authors of the paper adopted a desktop analysis approach through valid and first-hand reliable sources like government and university official releases. This research methodology would involve a systematic and rigorous approach to data collection and analysis to ensure the reliability and validity of the research findings. Through coding and thematic analysis of the collected data, the researchers concluded that the efficiency of the responses and decisions adopted by higher education institutions varied depending on a range of factors such as the institution's resources, infrastructure, and student population. However, the pandemic highlighted the need for agile and serious responses to ensure the safety and well-being of students and the campus community. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Infectious illness prevention and control is an important part of public health management. The early monitoring and numerical modelling of incidence data can help with the efficient prevention and control of infectious disease prevalence. The reproduction number R, as an essential index to understand the dynamics of COVID-19, can be predicted by using confirmed new incidence cases and serial interval data in the datasets provided by UK government. In this paper, an extended model is proposed to account for variable reporting rates instead of 1 for the estimation of the R number. The impact of using various modelling parameters is also evaluated, which provides insight into how to select a set of suitable parameters in modelling. The variation of the estimation of the R number by incorporating variable reporting rates can be observed and assessed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a UK-based group of female postgraduate researchers, the authors explored their experiences during COVID-19 pandemic through multivocal inquiry via a feminist collaborative autoethnographic project. In this paper, we use the Listening Guide as a tool to revisit and (re)analyse data from the aforementioned project, displaying findings in the form of voice poems. In utilising the Listening Guide, we discovered that listening is less of an exercise and more an art form. While the structured approach of the LG helped to enhance our understandings of wider individual experiences of disability and womanhood, identities that all authors inhabit, we were surprised to find that despite our established mutual trust and superficially similar experiences, we were unable to find emotional resonance through data that wasn't our own voice. We also found that the traditional stepped process of the LG that incorporates four listens to the data left our interpretations feeling flat. Through reflexivity and the novel collaborative approach we undertook in this analysis, we identified and implemented an augmentation of the Listening Guide process. In this paper, we propose an additional fifth listen, focusing on emotion, to facilitate a more holistic analysis of voice data. We explore how the fifth listen assisted the (re)construction of individual and collective identities, helping us to reshape our understandings. Finally, we elucidate the positives and pitfalls we experienced in the Listening Guide as a data analysis tool, recommending to other researchers the adoption of an iterative, flexible and reflexive approach in using it during collaborative research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Clinical research infrastructure is one of the unsung heroes of the scientific response to the current COVID-19 pandemic. The extensive, long-term funding into research support structures, skilled people, and technology allowed the United Kingdom research response to move off the starting blocks at pace by utilizing pre-existing platforms. The increasing focus from funders on evaluating the outcomes and impact of research infrastructure investment requires both a reframing and progression of the current models in order to address the contribution of the underlying support infrastructure. The majority of current evaluation/outcome models focus on a "pipeline" approach using a methodology which follows the traditional research funding route with the addition of quantitative metrics. These models fail to embrace the complexity caused by the interplay of previous investment, the coalescing of project outputs from different funders, the underlying infrastructure investment, and the parallel development across different parts of the system. Research infrastructure is the underpinning foundation of a project-driven research system and requires long-term, sustained funding and capital investment to maintain scientific and technological expertise. Therefore, the short-term focus on quantitative metrics that are easy to collect and interpret and that can be assessed in a roughly 5-year funding cycle needs to be addressed. The significant level of investment in research infrastructure necessitates investment to develop bespoke methodologies that develop fit-for-purpose, longer-term/continual approach(es) to evaluation. Real-world research should reflect real-world evaluation and allow for the accrual of a narrative of value indicators that build a picture of the contribution of infrastructure to research outcomes. The linear approach is not fit for purpose, the research endeavour is a complex, twisted road, and the evaluation approach needs to embrace this complexity through the development of realist approaches and the rapidly evolving data ecosystem. This paper sets out methodological challenges and considers the need to develop bespoke methodological approaches to allow a richer assessment of impact, contribution, attribution, and evaluation of research infrastructure. This paper is the beginning of a conversation that invites the community to "take up the mantle" and tackle the complexity of real-world research translation and evaluation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: The COVID‐19 Psychological Research Consortium (C19PRC) Study was established in March 2020 to monitor the psychological and socio‐economic impact of the pandemic in the UK and other countries. This paper describes the protocol for Wave 5 (March–April 2021). Methods: The survey assessed: COVID‐19 related experiences; experiences of common mental health disorders; psychological characteristics; and social and political attitudes. Adults who participated in any previous wave (N = 4949) were re‐invited to participate. Weights were calculated using a survey raking algorithm to ensure the longitudinal panel was nationally representative in terms of gender, age, and household income, amongst other factors. Results: Overall, 2520 adults participated. A total of 2377 adults who participated in the previous survey wave (November–December 2020) were re‐interviewed at Wave 5 (61.5% retention rate). Attrition between these two waves was predicted by younger age, lower household income, children living in the household, and treatment for mental health difficulties. Of the adults recruited into the C19PRC study at baseline, 57.4% (N = 1162) participated in Wave 5. The raking procedure re‐balanced the longitudinal panel to within 1.5% of population estimates for selected socio‐demographic characteristics. Conclusion: This paper outlines the growing strength of the publicly available C19PRC Study data for COVID‐19‐related interdisciplinary research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Plain English summary: Patient and Public Involvement (PPI) describes the active involvement of patients and the public in the research process. Through PPI, patients and members of the public are increasingly involved in the design and conduct of clinical trials. PPI has been shown to improve the quality and relevance of research. During the COVID-19 pandemic, clinical trials have been playing a vital role in helping us find ways to prevent and treat the infection and improve our understanding of the virus. It is important that patients and the public are actively involved in deciding how COVID-19 research is carried out. Unfortunately, Research Ethics Committees in the UK have seen far less PPI for COVID-19 research studies compared with research before the pandemic. A key reason for this is that research is being designed much faster than normal and researchers may feel they do not have time to properly involve patients and the public. In this paper, we share our experiences of PPI for a COVID-19 clinical trial. We show that it is possible to rapidly involve patients and the public in COVID-19 clinical trials. We also explain how the design of the clinical trial was changed in response to feedback from public contributors. Lastly, we discuss the wider learning from this process which might be useful for researchers planning PPI activities for COVID-19 clinical trials in the future. Background: Clinical trials are playing a critical role in the global public health response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite the increasing recognition of the value of PPI in clinical trials, just 22% of the COVID-19 research proposals reviewed by Research Ethics Committees in the UK at the start of the pandemic reported PPI. There is a perception that PPI might result in delays in delivering research and therefore delays in obtaining important results. In this paper, we report our experience of rapid PPI for a COVID-19 clinical trial. Methods: RAPID-19 is a COVID-19 clinical trial which was planned to be submitted for fast-track ethics review in the United Kingdom. During the development of the trial protocol, the PPI Panel at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Clinical Trials Unit was involved in the design of the study. The meeting with the PPI Panel lasted just over 1 h and was conducted by teleconference. Results: Although we only had a short period of time to explore the study with the PPI Panel, we were able to gain valuable insight into how the trial would be perceived by potential trial participants. Substantive changes were made to the trial to improve the acceptability of the research without compromising the study timelines. Having access to public contributors with relevant lived experience is an important resource for a Clinical Trials Unit and is critical for rapid PPI. The move to remote working due to lockdown required virtual discussions which helped to overcome some of the barriers to organising face-to-face meetings at short notice. Conclusions: PPI for clinical trials can be conducted in a time-efficient manner within the pressured environment of a pandemic. Involving PPI contributors at an early stage in protocol development maximised the opportunity to shape and influence the trial as well as limited potential delays which could occur if changes to the protocol had to be made at a later stage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic had a significant impact on the operations and functionality of the public transport sector in the UK. This paper reflects on the experience of this sector through the pandemic period, and considers recommendations for any future mitigations required for either new COVID-19 waves or a different public health emergency. Methods: Semi-structured interviews were carried out with public transport experts, organisational leaders, workers and passengers in two phases: Phase 1 from January to May 2021, and Phase 2 from December 2021 to February 2022. Interviews were analysed thematically. Results: Using the 'What? So What? Now What?' reflective model, ideas are drawn out to describe (a) what changes occurred, (b) what effects these changes had on service provision as well as perceptions of risk and mitigation and (c) what lessons have been learned and how these findings can feed into pandemic preparedness for the future. Respondent reflections focussed on the importance of communication, leadership, and maintaining compliance. Conclusions: The wealth of experience gained through the COVID-19 pandemic in the public transport sector is extremely valuable. Through reflection on this experience, specific recommendations are made relating to these factors, covering: maintaining links across industry, access to information and data, understanding of mitigation effectiveness, improving messaging, challenges of behavioural mitigations, and clear lines of accountability. The recommendations made on the basis of this reflective process will help to improve public health strategy within the public transport sector. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Simple Summary: The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in widescale changes to how UK puppy buyers purchased their puppies. Many of these changes threatened canine welfare by increasing the likelihood of buyers purchasing a puppy from a low-welfare source, e.g., collecting a puppy away from its place of birth or without seeing their mother, both of which are currently illegal in the UK. However, whether these puppy-purchasing changes were limited only to the 2020 'peak pandemic' phase and had returned to their pre-pandemic baseline afterwards or had persisted into the later phases of the pandemic in 2021 was not known. This study explored how and why puppies were purchased in 2021 and then compared this to the same date-periods in 2020 and 2019. Valid responses were analysed from the owners of 1148 "2019 puppies", 4369 "2020 Pandemic Puppies", and 2080 "2021 puppies". Although some of the peak pandemic changes had returned to pre-pandemic levels in 2021, some worrying trends still persisted, including 2021 puppies being less likely to be viewed in-person pre-purchase or to be collected from inside their breeders' property, compared to 2019 puppies. Furthermore, concerning year-on-year increases were documented between 2019 and 2021 in the number of puppies being sold with a passport indicating importation to the UK, often under the minimum legal age for import. The issues identified in this paper require further monitoring and intervention to protect canine welfare in the future. The COVID-19 pandemic led to a surge in acquisitions of puppies in the UK, dubbed the "Pandemic Puppy" phenomenon. In addition to an increased demand for puppies, widespread changes to both why and how puppies were purchased during this period compared to pre-pandemic 2019 purchases were documented, many of which threatened canine welfare (e.g., puppies being collected away from their place of birth, without seeing their mother). This study aimed to explore which changes to the pre-purchase and purchase motivations and behaviours of UK owners who purchased a puppy aged <16 weeks in the 2020 phase of the COVID-19 pandemic had persisted into 2021 or had returned to pre-pandemic 2019 levels. An online survey was conducted during February to April 2022 from which 2080 valid responses were analysed ("2021 puppies") and compared with previously collected data from comparable cohorts in 2019 (n = 1148, "2019 puppies") and 2020 (n = 4369, "Pandemic Puppies"). While the majority of the peak pandemic changes documented in 2020 had returned to their 2019 pre-pandemic baseline, others persisted into 2021. Multinomial logistic regression models revealed that the shifts during 2020 towards owners viewing their puppy pre-purchase over video calls or via video recordings/photos rather than in-person and towards collecting their puppy from outside of their breeders' property rather than inside had persisted into 2021 and had not returned to pre-pandemic levels. Year-on-year significant rises in the number of puppies sold with a passport were documented between 2019 and 2021, with over 1 in 10 2021 puppies having been sold with a passport, the figure more than doubling since 2019. An increasing number of these puppies sold with a passport were under the minimum legal age for import at sale. Going forward, these concerning changes require further monitoring and human behaviour change interventions to tackle, including increased buyer awareness but also legislative approaches to prevent the greatest harm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous research has suggested that older trans and gender non-conforming (TGNC) people may face particular challenges related to stigma, social exclusion and discrimination in later life. However, direct data on social support and needs in older TGNC population both internationally and within the UK is limited due to the small, dispersed nature of this population, and the absence of specific data collection on aging TGNC populations. During the UK COVID-19 lockdown in summer 2020, older people and those with long-term health conditions were advised to adopt particular precautions. This study aimed to explore older TGNC people's social support networks, key concerns and unmet needs during the COVID-19 'lockdown'. A UK cross-sectional survey of LGBT + people aged 60+ (n = 375) was undertaken during the lockdown. This paper analyses responses from the subset (n = 38) of TGNC participants. The majority of TGNC respondents described diverse social networks, often centered around friends and non-kin social networks, although partners and adult children were also significant for some. In most cases, those with existing strong networks continued to maintain social connections during lockdown, albeit with some regrets about loss of activities and face-to-face connection. However, a minority of respondents had experienced greater challenges prior to lockdown, and may have been at increased vulnerability during the pandemic, for example indicating that they had no-one to call on for practical support in an emergency. When asked about unmet needs and challenges, social isolation was repeatedly raised as the most frequent concern. Several respondents also mentioned issues specifically affecting TGNC communities, including access to gender affirming care and a perceived rise in social intolerance. Health and social care providers should be aware of the diversity of support networks within TGNC communities. There may also be benefits in community sector interventions to help older TGNC build and maintain strong social networks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: A range of nonpharmaceutical public health interventions has been introduced in many countries following the rapid spread of Covid‐19 since 2020, including recommendations or mandates for the use of face masks or coverings in the community. While the effectiveness of face masks in reducing Covid‐19 transmission has been extensively discussed, scant attention has been paid to the lived experience of those wearing face masks. Method: Drawing on 40 narrative interviews with a purposive sample of people in the United Kingdom, with a particular focus on marginalised and minoritized groups, our paper explores experiences of face mask use during the pandemic. Results: We find that face masks have a range of societal, health and safety impacts, and prompted positive and negative emotional responses for users. We map our findings onto Lorenc and Oliver's framework for intervention risks. We suggest that qualitative data offer particular insights into the experiences of public health interventions, allowing the potential downsides and risks of interventions to be more fully considered and informing public health policies that might avoid inadvertent harm, particularly towards marginalised groups. Patient or Public Contribution: The study primarily involved members of the public in the conduct of the research, namely through participation in interviews (email and telephone). The conception for the study involved extensive discussions on social media with a range of people, and we received input and ideas from presentations we delivered on the preliminary analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims at modeling the COVID-19 spread in the United Kingdom and United States of America, by specifying an optimal statistical univarite model. A new lifetime distribution with three-parameters is introduced by a combination of inverse Rayleigh distribution and oddWeibull family of distributions to formulate the odd Weibull inverse Rayleigh (OWIR) distribution. Some of the mathematical properties of the OWIR distribution are discussed as linear representation, quantile, moments, function of moment production, hazard rate, stress-strength reliability, and order statistics. Maximum likelihood, maximum product spacing, and Bayesian estimation method are applied to estimate the unknown parameters of OWIR distribution. The parameters of the OWIR distribution are estimated under progressive type-II censoring scheme with random removal. A numerical results of a Monte Carlo simulation is obtained to assess the use of estimation methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) restrictions resulted in an increased emphasis on virtual communication in medical education. This study assessed the acceptability of virtual teaching in an online objective structured clinical examination (OSCE) series and its role in future education. Methods: Six surgical OSCE stations were designed, covering common surgical topics, with specific tasks testing data interpretation, clinical knowledge, and communication skills. These were delivered via Zoom to students who participated in student/patient/examiner role-play. Feedback was collected by asking students to compare online teaching with previous experiences of in-person teaching. Descriptive statistics were used for Likert response data, and thematic analysis for free-text items. Results: Sixty-two students provided feedback, with 81% of respondents finding online instructions preferable to paper equivalents. Furthermore, 65% and 68% found online teaching more efficient and accessible, respectively, than in-person teaching. Only 34% found communication with each other easier online; Forty percent preferred online OSCE teaching to in-person teaching. Students also expressed feedback in positive and negative free-text comments. Conclusion: The data suggested that generally students were unwilling for online teaching to completely replace in-person teaching. The success of online teaching was dependent on the clinical skill being addressed; some were less amenable to a virtual setting. However, online OSCE teaching could play a role alongside in-person teaching. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Globally, policymakers have overlooked the challenges faced by international migrants in host countries during the Covid‐19 pandemic. The policies and support systems designed by host governments highlight the lack of social justice and raise concerns for scholarly attention. Considering the experiences of international migrants living in the UK during the Covid‐19 lockdown from the theoretical perspective of coping, this interpretivist study investigates international migrants' coping strategies adopted during the first UK national lockdown. Data collected from 60 Chinese, Italian and Iranian migrants using semi‐structured interviews during the lockdown period were analysed thematically using NVivo. The findings show that migrants adopted multi‐layered and multi‐phase coping strategies. To cope with the anxiety and uncertainties caused by the pandemic, they initiated new practices informed by both home and host institution logics. Nevertheless, the hostile context's responses provoked unexpected new worries and triggered the adoption of additional and compromising practices. The paper illustrates how coping became paradoxical because migrants had to cope with the hostile reactions that their initial coping strategies provoked in the host environment. By introducing the new concept of coping with coping, this paper extends previous theoretical debate and leads to several managerial implications for governments and policymakers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Systematic mass testing in closed settings provides information on infection rates. • Test positivity was 11.6%, with only one-quarter reporting symptoms. • The prison wing handling new admissions reported the second-lowest positivity rate. • Testing uptake was higher in residents than in staff members. • Mass testing is a valuable tool to bring outbreaks under control quickly. The aim of this paper was to describe the results of mass asymptomatic testing for COVID-19 in a male prison in England following the declaration of an outbreak. It provides novel data on the implementation of a mass testing regime within a prison during the pandemic. The paper is an observational evaluation of the mass testing conducted for 6 months following the declaration of a COVID-19 outbreak within a prison. It investigated the incidence of positive cases in both staff and residents using polymerase chain reaction testing. Data from October 2020 until March 2021 was included. A total of 2170 tests were performed by 851 residents and 182 staff members; uptake was 48.3% for people living in prison and 30.4% for staff. Overall test positivity was 11.6% (14.3% for residents, 3.0% for staff), with around one-quarter of these reporting symptoms. The prison wing handling new admissions reported the second-lowest positivity rate (9.4%) of the eight wings. Mass testing for COVID-19 over a short space of time can lead to rapid identification of additional cases, particularly asymptomatic cases. Testing that relies on residents and staff reporting symptoms will underestimate the true extent of transmission and will likely lead to a prolonged outbreak. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the UK the socio-economic impacts of the COVID-19 mitigations over the course of the pandemic (March 2020 to the time of writing in January 2022) have been experienced unevenly and with differential intensities at both the regional and local scales. Using individual-level geocoded data (from the Understanding Society: UK Household Longitudinal Survey COVID-19 study) linking people to the places in which they live, we consider the regional and local disparities in the risks and outcomes of financial hardship as a result of early stage mitigations. This paper provides direct evidence from the UK of a concentration of vulnerabilities in areas of high deprivation, undermining the capacity of individuals within those areas to shelter from economic shocks. Furthermore, the geography of financial hardship appears largely compositional - attributable to the pre-existing characteristics of individuals within regions and neighbourhoods, rather than being explicitly driven by the spatial contextual effect of their social or physical environments. This has implications for UK regional economic policy, and the Levelling Up agenda in particular. It is not the regions and neighbourhoods that give rise to COVID-19 hardship per se, but the concentration of individual disadvantages of the people living within them. The persistence of compositional dis/advantages means that there is a need not only to direct ameliorative packages to the individual but also to use local areas as places where the (regional) Levelling Up agenda can break long-term place trajectories that lock in existing disparities which in turn yield unequal financial opportunities and outcomes in periods of crisis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The COVID‐19 health crisis has imposed extensive shocks to many global systems, particularly the UK food production chains, further challenging Eurocentric development discourses and stereotypes. Thus, this paper investigates how the pandemic has challenged the UK's development status by analysing how the pandemic has impacted the country's food industry. A literature review was conducted and used to identify, select and critically appraise publications between 2000 and 2021 discussing the challenges in the UK food system. The findings reveal that the UK's food industry is unsustainable as there are significant flaws in the system, that is food insecurity and food waste that go unaddressed. The impact of the pandemic has exacerbated the social and economic impacts of operating with such a system. Compounded with the geopolitical adjustments caused by Brexit, the UK is faced with the challenge of restructuring and developing new frameworks such as policies, regulations, schemes and partnerships to support the food industry's sustainability. Lastly, the findings reinforce that 'developed' and 'developing' nations encounter similar food challenges, which manifest differently in various landscapes and contexts. Therefore, the world (not just the UK) needs to shift away from Eurocentrism, moving towards a universal but equally personalised development outlook. This review provides an outline of the major problem areas in the UK food system and presents potential solutions aimed at helping guide the government's decision‐making process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The current paper describes an adaptation of a daypatient programme for adults with anorexia nervosa in the UK in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and consequent government guidelines. The paper details how the programme, which is normally delivered face-to-face, became a 'virtual' clinic, providing support to a group of patients via the Internet and conducting its core activities almost exclusively via videoconferencing. Anxiety around the pandemic influenced patients' feelings about recovery, and there were concerns about the programme moving online, which necessitated careful management. It has been possible to continue an intensive level of care given wider organisational backing and the support of the patients involved. Some of the patients' reflections on the experience are included in the article. As well as the adaptations, the article also discusses some of the challenges and opportunities encountered, in the hope of guiding similar services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes how the large budget deficits of 2020 in the United States and the United Kingdom were financed, how central banks are in practice managed not just short-term interest rates but also yields on government bonds, and how their ability to resist a post-coronavirus surge in inflation has been compromised. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since early this year, the world has been facing a hazardous new generation of coronavirus named COVID-19 which has rapidly spread to the extent that it has drowned the world into the pandemic condition. The spread of this pandemic has generated a strong contagion effect across markets around the globe. Therefore, it is necessary to examine the impact of COVID-19 for as many markets as possible. This paper aims to analyze the cosmetic retail market's behavior in the time of the COVID-19 pandemic using a combination of graphical statistics tools to observe the monthly growth of production and sales in cosmetic retail and toilet articles for the period from October 2019 to August 2020. The results assume that the COVID-19 can have a black swan effect on the cosmetic micro-market. These findings are remarkable for the cosmetic sector's investors and marketers to enhance their understanding of cosmetic retail market behavior during unpredictable events such as pandemics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background The dissemination of scientific data on coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) continually builds but, in April 2020, could not keep up with the spread of the disease. Through technology, surgeons in Italy and the UK, representing both peak and pre-peak infective time zones, were able to communicate so that the urgent lessons on the huge expected demands of care learned in Italy could be brought to the UK in advance. This paper specifically discusses the issues related to paediatric surgery, currently under-reported in the literature. Methods The aim of this paper is to conjoin experience from the field to provide a framework for a safe assessment and treatment of paediatric patients by adopting a systemic approach aimed at reducing the risk of contamination. We reviewed the processes and good practices that were undertaken in contexts of emergency such as in Italy and the UK and then adapted them within the Systems Engineering Initiative for Patient Safety (SEIPS) framework to provide an assessment of how to reorganize the services in order to cope with an unexpected situation. The SEIPS model is the adopted theoretical framework, which allows to analyse the system in its main components with a human factors and ergonomics (HFE) perspective. Results The results introduce some of the good practices and recommendations developed during the emergency in the surgical scenario with a focus on the paediatric patients. They represent the lessons learned from the combination of the little existing evidence of literature and the experience from surgical teams who responded in an impromptu and unrehearsed way. Conclusions Lessons learned from the frontline 'on the fly' during COVID-19 emergency should be consolidated and taken into the future. In order to prepare proactively for the next phases and get ahead of the curve of these hospital accesses, there is a need for a risk assessment of the new clinical pathways with a multidisciplinary approach centred on HFE with the adoption of the SEIPS model and an involvement of all the surgical teams. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The COVID-19 global pandemic has had a profound impact on the taken-for-granted familial connections bound up in VFR travel. This paper examines the emotional impacts on diasporic migrants who could not travel to their homeland for extended periods of time. It considers pre-pandemic VFR patterns and assesses new meanings attributed to post-pandemic renewed travel. The lived experiences, patterns and emotions of seventy mainly UK-based participants were examined in this study. The research approach used both Maslow's hierarchy of needs analysis and Urry's tourist-gaze as conceptual frames for assessing these emotional experiences. The research showed that for many diasporas, the need to travel home is central to a sense of personal and place-identity as well as emotional security. The impacts of the pandemic in terms of wellbeing and emotional health were keenly felt by study respondents. Furthermore, contrary to much prior VFR research, this pandemic related study showed that in this instance, it is the "people" of VFR rather than just the "place" (of home) that are most valued. The removal of the right to VFR travel reinforced the centrality of family connections, especially in times of crisis. A mindful, VFR gaze emerges, rooted deeply in Maslow's basic human needs pillars of safety, love and belonging. This was shown to be a highly tuned post-COVID-19 gaze, where familiar touchstones of home helped to restore depleted emotions through performances and practices of connectivity. The unique global pandemic experience of a world full of migrant mobile diaspora brought to an abrupt halt, emphasizes the need for tourism research to focus on the emotions embedded in the inherent human-place connections of VFR travel. The longitudinal-temporal legacy of COVID-19 on this form of tourism requires future research attention for both the tourism industry and tourists themselves. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Researchers conducting cohort studies may wish to investigate the effect of episodes of COVID-19 illness on participants. A definitive diagnosis of COVID-19 is not always available, so studies have to rely on proxy indicators. This paper seeks to contribute evidence that may assist the use and interpretation of these COVID-indicators.Methods: We described five potential COVID-indicators: self-reported core symptoms, a symptom algorithm; self-reported suspicion of COVID-19; self-reported external results; and home antibody testing based on a 'lateral flow' antibody (IgG/IgM) test cassette. Included were staff and postgraduate research students at a large London university who volunteered for the study and were living in the UK in June 2020. Excluded were those who did not return a valid antibody test result. We provide descriptive statistics of prevalence and overlap of the five indicators.Results: Core symptoms were the most common COVID-indicator (770/1882 participants positive, 41%), followed by suspicion of COVID-19 (n = 509/1882, 27%), a positive symptom algorithm (n = 298/1882, 16%), study antibody lateral flow positive (n = 124/1882, 7%) and a positive external test result (n = 39/1882, 2%), thus a 20-fold difference between least and most common. Meeting any one indicator increased the likelihood of all others, with concordance between 65 and 94%. Report of a low suspicion of having had COVID-19 predicted a negative antibody test in 98%, but positive suspicion predicted a positive antibody test in only 20%. Those who reported previous external antibody tests were more likely to have received a positive result from the external test (24%) than the study test (15%).Conclusions: Our results support the use of proxy indicators of past COVID-19, with the caveat that none is perfect. Differences from previous antibody studies, most significantly in lower proportions of participants positive for antibodies, may be partly due to a decline in antibody detection over time. Subsequent to our study, vaccination may have further complicated the interpretation of COVID-indicators, only strengthening the need to critically evaluate what criteria should be used to define COVID-19 cases when designing studies and interpreting study results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pandemics historically have killed as many people as the wars that have beset this world, yet the resources committed to pandemic prevention and response are a fraction of the resources we commit to security. This paper examines the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020 by analysing the preparedness and responses of the UK, the USA, Germany, and South Korea. We will evidence that the UK and USA lacked the levels of preparedness that global health reports indicated, and that their responses were diametrically opposite of those of Germany and South Korea. We argue that decades of deregulation and privatization due to neoliberal, free-market economics by the UK and USA led to the Great Recession of 2008. This, in turn, led to economic collapse and austerity (increased neoliberalism), which negatively impacted investment in healthcare in the UK and USA. This resulted in very different levels of preparedness and responses by the four countries under the microscope. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

INTRODUCTION During the COVID-19 pandemic, pregnant women were regarded as vulnerable to poor health outcomes if infected with the SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19) virus. To protect the United Kingdom’s (UK) National Health Service (NHS) and pregnant patients, strict infection control policies and regulations were implemented. This study aimed to understand the impact of the COVID-19 policies and guidelines on maternal and reproductive health services during the pandemic from the experiences of healthcare workers (HCWs) caring for these patients. METHODS This qualitative study involved HCWs from the United Kingdom Research study into Ethnicity and COVID-19 outcomes in Healthcare workers (UK-REACH) project. Semi-structured interviews and focus groups were conducted online or by telephone with 44 diverse HCWs. Transcripts were thematically analyzed following Braun and Clarke’s principles of qualitative analysis. RESULTS Three key themes were identified during analysis. First, infection control policies impacted appointment availability, resulting in many cancellations and delays to treatment. Telemedicine was also used extensively to reduce risks from face-to-face consultations, disadvantaging patients from minoritized ethnicities. Secondly, staff shortages and redeployments reduced availability of consultations, appointments, and sonography scans. Finally, staff and patients reported challenges accessing timely, reliable and accurate information and guidance. CONCLUSIONS COVID-19 demonstrated how a global health crisis can impact maternal and reproductive health services, leading to reduced service quality and surgical delays due to staff redeployment policies. Our findings underscore the implications of policy and future health crises preparedness. This includes tailored infection control policies, addressing elective surgery backlogs early and improved dissemination of relevant vaccine information. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The severe restrictions placed upon face‐to‐face meetings during the Covid pandemic in 2020/2021 created new challenges for the on‐going research into food systems in the Portsmouth community. The researchers had planned to use soft action research which involves participants meeting face‐to‐face. The restrictions that were imposed during the pandemic forbade such meetings and created a new set of issues for the researchers to overcome. In this paper, we describe how these shortcomings were addressed and introduce a novel way of adapting soft action research through the use of Information and Communication Technologies. The lessons learnt from our experiences will help inform researchers and professionals using Soft methods of inquiry and open opportunities for others to explore further the benefits and disadvantages of online investigation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The COVID-19 pandemic has been characterized by a social media "infodemic": an overabundance of information whose authenticity may not always be guaranteed. With the potential to lead individuals to harmful decisions for the society, this infodemic represents a severe threat to information security, public health and democracy. In this paper, we assess the interplay between the infodemic and specific aspects of the pandemic, such as the number of cases, the strictness of containment measures, and the news media coverage. We perform a comparative study on three countries that employed different managements of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020—namely Italy, the United Kingdom, and New Zealand. We first analyze the three countries from an epidemiological perspective to characterize the impact of the pandemic and the strictness of the restrictions adopted. Then, we collect a total of 6 million posts from Facebook to describe user news consumption behaviors with respect to the reliability of such posts. Finally, we quantify the relationship between the number of posts published in each of the three countries and the number of confirmed cases, the strictness of the restrictions adopted, and the online news media coverage about the pandemic. Our results show that posts referring to reliable sources are consistently predominant in the news circulation, and that users engage more with reliable posts rather than with posts referring to questionable sources. Furthermore, our modelling results suggest that factors related to the epidemiological and informational ecosystems can serve as proxies to assess the evolution of the infodemic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The scale of the UK government's response to the Covid‐19 crisis after the first lockdown in March 2020 was unprecedented. For the business sector, two financing schemes were particularly relevant: the Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CBILS) and the Bounce Back Loan Scheme (BBLS). Both were designed to support the capitalization of businesses through this difficult trading period. In this paper, we use data covering the first two quarters of the Covid‐19 crisis to explore the dynamics of small and medium‐sized enterprise (SME) financing and in particular the role of government support schemes. Our findings show that 92.1% of all debt funds provided in this period were backed by the UK government, which compares to less than 5% under normal circumstances. We find that the demand, supply and government share of SME lending increased from Covid‐19 quarter 1 (April–June 2020) to quarter 2 (July–September 2020), that micro and small businesses had the highest demand for loans, and that better‐performing firms were more likely to receive loans. Further, in a world where more loan requests than ever were granted, the government share of this pool of loans had a different risk profile than the small pool of non‐government‐backed loans. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we take up the call to further examine structural injustice in health, and racial inequalities in particular. We examine the many facets of racism: structural, interpersonal and institutional as they appeared in the COVID‐19 pandemic in the UK, and emphasize the relevance of their systemic character. We suggest that such inequalities were entirely foreseeable, for their causal mechanisms are deeply ingrained in our social structures. It is by recognizing the conventional, un‐extraordinary nature of racism within social systems that we can begin to address socially mediated health inequalities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Following the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, public-health measures introduced to stem the spread of the disease caused profound changes to patterns of daily-life communication. This paper presents the results of an online survey conducted to document adult cochlear-implant (CI) users' perceived listening difficulties under four communication scenarios commonly experienced during the pandemic, specifically when talking: with someone wearing a facemask, under social/physical distancing guidelines, via telephone, and via video call. Results from ninety-four respondents indicated that people considered their in-person listening experiences in some common everyday scenarios to have been significantly worsened by the introduction of mask-wearing and physical distancing. Participants reported experiencing an array of listening difficulties, including reduced speech intelligibility and increased listening effort, which resulted in many people actively avoiding certain communication scenarios at least some of the time. Participants also found listening effortful during remote communication, which became rapidly more prevalent following the outbreak of the pandemic. Potential solutions identified by participants to ease the burden of everyday listening with a CI may have applicability beyond the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. Specifically, the results emphasized the importance of visual cues, including lipreading and live speech-to-text transcriptions, to improve in-person and remote communication for people with a CI. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Government policies during the COVID-19 pandemic have drastically altered patterns of energy demand around the world. Many international borders have been closed and populations have been confined to their homes, which has reduced transport and changed consumption patterns. A decrease in CO2 emissions and pollution has thus been recorded during forced confinements. This has offered a glimpse of how the world might look like with a drastic reduction of human impact. The present paper explores how facts are framed in news discourse and investigates the recontextualization of the environmental issue in news media. The study analyses a collection of news articles about the consequences of coronavirus on the environment published on the websites of the major news channels in the UK, namely BBC News and Sky News. This CDA investigation studies how the UK news outlets re-mediated scientific knowledge about climate change to emphasise or minimise the positive consequences of confinement on the planet. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Remote consultations (RCs) enable clinicians to continue to support patients when face-to-face appointments are not possible. Restrictions to face-to-face care during the COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated a pre-existing trend for their adoption. This is true for many health professionals including some chiropractors. Whilst most chiropractors in the UK have used RCs in some form during the pandemic, others have not. This study seeks to understand the views of chiropractors not using RCs and to explore perceived potential barriers. Methods: A national online survey was completed by 534 registered practicing UK chiropractors on the use of RCs. Respondents had the opportunity of providing open-ended responses concerning lack of engagement in RCs during the COVID-19 pandemic. Textual responses obtained from 137 respondents were coded and analysed using thematic analysis. Results: The use of RCs provided an opportunity for chiropractors to deliver ongoing care during the COVID-19 pandemic. However, many chiropractors expressed concern that RCs misaligned with their strong professional identity of providing 'hands-on' care. Some chiropractors also perceived that patients expected physical interventions during chiropractic care and thus considered a lack of demand when direct contact is not possible. In the absence of a physical examination, some chiropractors had concerns about potential misdiagnosis, and perceived lack of diagnostic information with which to guide treatment. Clinic closures and change in working environment led to practical difficulties of providing remote care for a few chiropractors. Conclusions: The COVID-19 pandemic may have accelerated changes in the way healthcare is provided with RCs becoming more commonplace in primary healthcare provision. This paper highlights perceived barriers which may lead to reduced utilisation of RCs by chiropractors, some of which appear fundamental to their perceived identity, whilst others are likely amenable to change with training and experience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

INTRODUCTION During the pandemic, smokers who wished to access support to quit faced additional barriers. A smoking cessation service which utilized pharmacist independent prescribers working within community pharmacy was implemented. Clients received behavioral advice via a consultation with an advisor and then three consultations with a pharmacist, who prescribed varenicline, where appropriate. Consultations were by phone or video. This evaluation assessed the self-reported outcomes and experiences of clients and pharmacists. METHODS A mixed-methods approach was used involving both on-line questionnaires to clients and interviews with a sample of questionnaire respondents and participating prescribing pharmacists. RESULTS The questionnaire was completed by 85 clients with 59% reporting they had quit. Eleven clients and seven out of eight pharmacists were interviewed. Varenicline had been received by 96% of clients. The best aspects of the service reported by clients in the questionnaire and at interview were support received from the pharmacist and ease of access to varenicline. Clients regarded the service as being 'safe' to access during the pandemic. Nearly three-quarters of client respondents (72%) stated no service improvements were required. However, national supply challenges made collection of varenicline from the nominated pharmacy an issue. Some clients experienced a long wait-time before accessing the service. For pharmacists, the service offered flexibility including the opportunity to contact clients 'out of office' hours without distractions. However, not being physically in the pharmacy could result in them not being able to access the client's medicine history. Pharmacists identified that remote consultations were not ideal for all clients. CONCLUSIONS Pharmacist prescribers can deliver effective smoking cessation services through remote consultations. Greater flexibility would allow the service to be tailored to the client's need. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: The COVID‐19 Psychological Research Consortium (C19PRC) Study aims to assess the impact of the COVID‐19 pandemic in the adult population in multiple countries. This paper describes the third wave of the UK survey (the 'parent' strand of the Consortium) during July‐August 2020. Methods: Adults (N = 2025) who participated in the baseline and/or first follow‐up surveys were reinvited to participate in this survey, which assessed: (1) COVID‐19 related knowledge, attitudes, and behaviours; (2) the occurrence of common mental disorders; as well as the role of (3) psychological factors and (4) social and political attitudes, in influencing the public's response to the pandemic. Weights were calculated using a survey raking algorithm to ensure that the cross‐sectional sample is nationally representative in terms of gender, age, and household income, and representative of the baseline sample characteristics for household composition, ethnicity, urbanicity and born/raised in UK. Results: 1166 adults (57.6% of baseline participants) provided full interviews at Wave 3. The raking procedure successfully re‐balanced the cross‐sectional sample to within 1% of population estimates across selected socio‐demographic characteristics. Conclusion: This paper demonstrates the strength of the C19PRC Study data to facilitate and stimulate interdisciplinary research addressing important public health questions relating to the COVID‐19 pandemic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we examine the multiple significations of the "frontline" metaphor in the UK during the first ten months of COVID-19. We argue that the term "frontline" has operated as a performative frame, which has helped to produce the very notion and the materialization of the "COVID-19 frontline" and keyworkers. Showing how the UK government has repeatedly cited this metaphor, we outline the contradictory effects it has generated through an interplay of hyper-visibility and opaqueness. The frontline metaphor has been used to justify the government's injection of massive amounts of public money into the economy, render hyper-visible workers who had previously been invisible, whilst generating a sense of civic responsibility. Simultaneously, however, the metaphor has created a smokescreen for corrupt practices, deflecting attention away from resource-starved health and social care infrastructures and intensifying forms of "everyday bordering" and "everyday racism" that deepen structural injustices in the UK. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Emerging voices of patients in the form of opinions and expectations about the quality of care can improve healthcare service quality. A large volume of patients’ opinions as online doctor reviews (ODRs) are available online to access, analyze, and improve patients’ perceptions. This paper aims to explore COVID-19-related conversations, complaints, and sentiments using ODRs posted by users of the physician rating website. We analyzed 96,234 ODRs of 5,621 physicians from a prominent health rating website in the United Kingdom (Iwantgreatcare.org) in threetime slices (i.e., from February 01 to October 31, 2020). We employed machine learning approach, dynamic topic modeling, to identify prominent bigrams, salient topics and labels, sentiments embedded in reviews and topics, and patient-perceived root cause and strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats (SWOT) analyses to examine SWOT for healthcare organizations. This method finds a total of 30 latent topics with 10 topics across each time slice. The current study identified new discussion topics about COVID-19 occurring from time slice 1 to time slice 3, such as news about the COVID-19 pandemic, violence against the lockdown, quarantine process and quarantine centers at different locations, and vaccine development/treatment to stop virus spread. Sentiment analysis reveals that fear for novel pathogen prevails across all topics. Based on the SWOT analysis, our findings provide a clue for doctors, hospitals, and government officials to enhance patients’ satisfaction and minimize dissatisfaction by satisfying their needs and improve the quality of care during the COVID-19 crisis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Occupational musculoskeletal injuries are prevalent in healthcare workers and are reported to be profession-specific. There is, however, a paucity of information around the injuries sustained from working as a podiatrist. This paper looks at the incidence of injury from working as a podiatrist, the aggravating factors to sustain these injuries and whether the changes in workload due to the COVID-19 pandemic altered the incidence. Methods: A modified work based musculoskeletal injury questionnaire was distributed in the UK via podiatry led social media platforms. Open and Closed questions explored the demographics of the sample, perceived injury 12 months prior to the COVID-19 pandemic and then 6 months into the lockdown. Pre and post COVID-19 data were analysed for differences and thematic analysis was included to categorise reported experiences. Results: 148 podiatrists representing 3 % of HCPC registered practitioners responded to the questionnaire. Employment status altered as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic with a 13 % reduction in those working full time. Environments also changed with domiciliary and telehealth significantly increasing (p > 0.00) and non-clinical roles being extended (p > 0.002). Pain frequency and intensity significantly (p > 0.04) increased as a result of the pandemic with shoulder pain being most frequent before lockdown altering to the neck during the lockdown. Two main themes were identified that were attributed to the causes of pain including physical demands and working in awkward spaces. Conclusions: Work-related musculoskeletal pain in podiatrists is common with the shoulder and neck being the most frequently affected. Changes in work practices due to the restrictions enforced from the COVID-19 pandemic increased the frequency and intensity of pain mostly associated with increased domiciliary and telehealth working environments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]