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There is increasing interest amongst researchers and policy makers in identifying the effect of public health interventions on health inequalities by socioeconomic status (SES). This issue is typically addressed in evaluation studies through subgroup analyses, where researchers test whether the effect of an intervention differs according to the socioeconomic status of participants. The credibility of such analyses is therefore crucial when making judgements about how an intervention is likely to affect health inequalities, although this issue appears to be rarely considered within public health. The aim of this study was therefore to assess the credibility of subgroup analyses in published evaluations of public health interventions. An established set of 10 credibility criteria for subgroup analyses was applied to a purposively sampled set of 21 evaluation studies, the majority of which focussed on healthy eating interventions, which reported differential intervention effects by SES. While the majority of these studies were found to be otherwise of relatively high quality methodologically, only 8 of the 21 studies met at least 6 of the 10 credibility criteria for subgroup analysis. These findings suggest that the credibility of subgroup analyses conducted within evaluations of public health interventions’ impact on health inequalities may be an underappreciated problem. Keywords: Health inequalities, Health inequities, Equity and public health interventions, Policy impact by socioeconomic status

INTRODUCTION: Obesity is a global pandemic that affects all socioeconomic strata, however, the highest figures have been observed in the most disadvantaged social groups. Evidence from the USA and Canada showed that specific urban settings encourage obesogenic behaviour in the population living and/or working there. We aim to examine the evidence on the association between local food environments and obesity in the UK, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand.METHODS: Six databases from 1990 to 2017 will be searched: MEDLINE (Ovid), Embase (Ovid), Scopus, The Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature (CINAHL), Applied Social Sciences Index and Abstracts (ASSIA) and Web of Science. Grey literature will also be sought by searching Opengrey Europe, The Grey Literature Report and relevant government websites. Additional studies will be retrieved from the reference lists of the selected articles. It will include cohort, longitudinal, case study and cross-sectional studies that have assessed the relationship between local food environments and obesity in the UK, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand regardless of sex, age and ethnicity of the population. Two researchers will independently select the studies and extract the data. Data items will incorporate: author names, title, study design, year of study, year exposure data collected, country, city, urban/rural, age range, study exclusions, special characteristics of study populations, aims, working definitions of food environments and food outlets, exposure and methods of data collection, outcomes and key findings. A narrative synthesis and a summary of the results will be produced separately for children and adults, according to the type of food exposure-outcome. All the selected studies will be assessed using The Quality Assessment Tool for Observational Cohort and Cross-Sectional Studies.ETHICS AND DISSEMINATION: This study will be based on published literature, and therefore ethical approval has not been sought. Our findings will be presented at relevant national and international scientific conferences and published in a peer-reviewed journal.

Porcine Reproductive and Respiratory Syndrome (PRRS) is an important disease of pigs. Sow farrowing and service data were obtained from two commercial pig multiplication units which experienced several confirmed PRRS outbreaks. Genomic regions associated with reproductive failure during PRRS outbreaks were investigated using a regional heritability mapping (RHM) approach combining the two datasets. Covariates were explored both fitting and ignoring the shape of the epidemic. Heritability (h2) of farrowing mortality (FMOR, proportion of dead piglets per litter) was 0.084 ignoring the epidemic shape and 0.059 fitting it. The additive genetic variance was non-estimable for the FMOR trait during non-epidemic phase. Two regions were significantly associated with FMOR at the genome-wide level, on Sus scrofa chromosomes (SSCs) 4 and 7, with several other regions approaching significance. A single SNP on SSC4 was significantly associated (P

The paper is an accouunt of a year's work on the bionomics of Glossina morsitans in the Koalib Hills, Nuba Mountains Province, Sudan, a small area which lies 200 to 300 miles north of any other locality where G. morsitans occurs.The fly is restricted at all times of the year to the hills, where it was found to breed in rock-shade, and is always closely associated with the Nuba inhabitants and their animals, even frequenting villages and their environs. The cattle, goats and sheep are resistant to trypanosomiasis, but all have been proved to be carriers of the disease.Wild fauna is scarce in and near the area, and the fly is probably entirely dependent for food on the Nubas and their animals.An experiment in direct control in a small group of hills is described. It was found impossible to reduce the fly beyond a very low minimum, but the method would be of use as a routine control in small hills.Experiment with fly lime indicated that the shiny appearance of the lime deterred the majority of flies from alighting upon it.Marked flies remained in the bush for ten to fifteen days during the rains, but eventually returned to the hills. Given a constant food supply there seems no reason why many parts of the bush, otherwise suitable, should not harbour fly during the rains and early dry season.The author is indebted to Major R. G. Archibald, C.M.G., D.S.O., M.D., Director of Wellcome Tropical Research Laboratories, and to Mr. H. H. King, Government Entomologist, for much assistance and advice, also to the Provincial and District Officials for help in many ways.