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SETTING: Japan: a low-TB-burden country. OBJECTIVE: To characterise TB-related technical enquiries received in 2020–2022, and share the lessons learnt. DESIGN: This was a descriptive study. RESULTS: We received 1,898 communications, of which 1,447 (40.2 per month) were classified as technical enquiries, 34% fewer than the 2,197 enquiries received in 2017–2019. The enquiry rates were highest for Shimane (4.32/100,000 population) and Yamanashi (2.59/100,000 population) prefectures, and lowest in Ehime (0.00/100,000 population) and Yamagata (0.09/100,000 population) prefectures. The main organisations the enquirers belonged to were local governments (n = 989, 68.3%) and healthcare facilities (n = 242, 16.7%). The enquirers included medical doctors (n = 236, 16.3%), nurses (n = 814, 56.3%), and the general public (n = 141, 9.7%). The most frequent enquiries were about TB diagnosis and treatment, including laboratory diagnosis (n = 442, 30.6%), followed by the regulatory framework (n = 216, 14.9%), contact investigation (n = 151, 10.8%), and TB in foreigners (n = 112, 7.9%). CONCLUSION: During the COVID-19 era, we received two-thirds of technical enquiries compared with 2017–2019, because local health offices were overwhelmed by the pandemic. Since the most frequent enquiries were about diagnosis and treatment of TB, the health ministry of Japan should maintain a few specialised TB institutions with TB physicians to provide technical assistance.

Background: Burn injuries in children in low- and middle-income countries are common, serious, and preventable. Despite the high burden of disease, there is a paucity of data on the profile of paediatric burns in South Africa. Such data are essential to local burn prevention strategies. Methods: A retrospective review of all recorded paediatric burns admissions to the paediatric burns unit at Chris Hani Baragwanath Academic Hospital was performed from 1 January 2015 – 31 December 2020. Ethical approval was obtained. Data extracted anonymously included patient age, sex, mechanism of injury, injury severity, date of injury and residential location. Results: A total of 2980 admissions occurred during the study period. Infants ≤ 1 year accounted for 42.2 % (1259/2980), males 61.4 % (1689/2751), hot water burns 79.1 % (2357/2980), and major injury 40.1 % (1201/2980) of admissions. Most burn injuries occurred in winter (28.2 %, 842/2980), and most admitted patients lived in Soweto 45.5 % (1355/2980). Conclusions: Most burns admissions in the study period were characterised by male children less than one year of age, hot water burns, major burn injuries and admissions in the winter months. These results are similar to national and international data regarding age, sex, mechanism of injury and seasonality of paediatric burns. The results from the study have been utilised to inform Surgeons For Little Lives’ paediatric burns prevention campaigns in Soweto and Gauteng Province.

We explore the effect of individual perceptions of climate anomalies on collective action within a context of environmental complexity and uncertainty. To do so, we construct two competing propositions that are theoretically robust but with very different real-world implications. Our first proposition suggests that collective action to adapt to climate change is likely to be more effective when perceptions of climate anomalies converge within a community. Our second proposition suggests the opposite: that convergence is likely to hinder adaptation behaviour. We use a community co-designed measure of perceptions and an artefactual field experiment to test our propositions and explore the effect of perception convergence on climate change adaptation behaviour in six communities in Malaysian Borneo. We find a robust positive relationship between convergent perceptions of climate anomalies and the collective action required to adapt to climate change. Our findings suggest that perception convergence is an underexplored and potentially crucial factor that can either drive or hinder adaptation efforts at the community-level.

Experimentally diarrhoea with enteropathogenic E. coli was induced in 18 buffalo calves (a week old) which were divided into three equal groups while 4th group of six calves served as uninfected, untreated control. All the calves were monitored twice daily. Diarrhea developed in all treatment groups within 2-6 hours post infection. Twenty four hours after the on-set of diarrhea, neonates of Group (G)-1 was treated with antibiotic (Kanamycin®, Farvet Laboratories, Holland @ 10 mg/kg b.wt I/M) plus rehydration solution (sodium chloride-10g, potassium chloride-4g, sodium bicarbonate-20g, glucose-50g and water-4 litres @ 250–500 ml/day/I/V), G-2 with antibiotic and G-3 with rehydration solution. Diarrheic contents varied from semi solid to watery in consistency, yellowish to greenish yellow colour with blood or mucous and frequency of defecation was 6-10 times/day. Dehydration was mild (4-5%) in G-1, moderate (6-9%) in G-3 and severe (10-12%) in G-2 calves. Most severe signs of dehydration appeared in G-2 calves. Neonates in this group showed severe dryness of cornea, loss of suckling reflex, sunken eyes, dry mucous membranes and cold extremities. Temperature was significantly high in G-3 calves than G-1, G-2 and control calves. Pulse and respiration rates were low in all treatment groups than the control group. Total erythrocytic counts and hematocrit were high (P

Abstract- The syndrome of diabetes mellitus, sensorineural deafness and megaloblastic anemia dose not result from thiamine deficiency. The previous reported patients had no sign of beriberi, had normal nutrition, and had no evidence of malabsorption. The features of this syndrome with apparent inheritance of autosomal recessive trait may define this puzzling syndrome as a true thiamine dependency state. The first Iranian patient was described by Vossough et al. in 1995. We found nine new cases with diagnostic criteria of thiamine responsive megaloblastic anemia during eight years of our study. In two patients, presentation of diabetes and anemia was concomitant. All of them were deaf with sensorineural hearing loss which was detected in infancy up to two years of age. The presence of congenital valvular heart disease was eliminated by normal echocardiography, but cardiomyopathy was discovered in two. Nonspecific amino-aciduria was discovered in three but urinary screening tests for hereditary orotic aciduria were negative. Ox-Phos biochemistry of muscle mitochondria which demonstrates severe defect in complexes I, III, IV in diabetes mellitus associated with deafness, were done but was unremarkable in our patients. Urinary methylmalonic acid and methyl malonyl carnitine by GS/MS and TMS was done in our patients and showed abnormal results in six patients. Thiamine gene, SLC 19A2, was detected in four patients.

This study was carried out to investigate neonatal calf mortality (NCM) in 864 Nili-Ravi buffalo calves born during 1993-2000 at the Livestock Production Research Institute (LPRI), Bahadurnagar, Okara, Pakistan. The overall mortality in buffalo neonates was 9.4%. The NCM in relation to birth weight, sex and age of neonatal calf showed non-significant difference. The highest mortality was recorded during 2nd week of age (35.0 and 39.0%) and summer season (11.5 and 12.3%) in male and female buffalo neonatal calves, respectively. Mortality was also high in calves born to first parity dams (11.3%). Morbidity and mortality due to various disease conditions showed highly significant (P = 0.0001) difference. Neonatal calf diarrhoea (NCD) rendered the highest morbidity (16.6%) and mortality (5.2%), followed by pneumonia and pneumono-enteritis. Mange (3.4%), navel-ill (3.1%) and umbilical hernia (1.6%) lead morbidity only. Relative risk of morbidity (two and seven times) and mortality (three and eight times) was more in calves with intermediate and low immunoglobulins (Igs) concentration, respectively as compared to calves having high Igs concentration (P = 0.000).

Abstract- The syndrome of diabetes mellitus, sensorineural deafness and megaloblastic anemia dose not result from thiamine deficiency. The previous reported patients had no sign of beriberi, had normal nutrition, and had no evidence of malabsorption. The features of this syndrome with apparent inheritance of autosomal recessive trait may define this puzzling syndrome as a true thiamine dependency state. The first Iranian patient was described by Vossough et al. in 1995. We found nine new cases with diagnostic criteria of thiamine responsive megaloblastic anemia during eight years of our study. In two patients, presentation of diabetes and anemia was concomitant. All of them were deaf with sensorineural hearing loss which was detected in infancy up to two years of age. The presence of congenital valvular heart disease was eliminated by normal echocardiography, but cardiomyopathy was discovered in two. Nonspecific amino-aciduria was discovered in three but urinary screening tests for hereditary orotic aciduria were negative. Ox-Phos biochemistry of muscle mitochondria which demonstrates severe defect in complexes I, III, IV in diabetes mellitus associated with deafness, were done but was unremarkable in our patients. Urinary methylmalonic acid and methyl malonyl carnitine by GS/MS and TMS was done in our patients and showed abnormal results in six patients. Thiamine gene, SLC 19A2, was detected in four patients.

Abstract Characterization of both uncalcined and calcined eggshells was done in this work. Raw eggshells turned out as a good source of calcite phase. Calcined eggshells had a mixture of lime and portlandite phase. A significant impact of calcination temperature on the percentage of generated phases was observed. Qualitative as well as semi-quantitative phase analysis, morphological characterization and physical property estimation was done for the produced powder. The influence of synthesized raw material on soil stabilization and biomaterial formation was further assessed. The eggshell turned out as a potential source of raw material for various sectors.