Search

Background: Oseltamivir resistance in influenza virus (IFV) has been of widespread concern. An increase in the frequency of viruses with reduced inhibition was observed. Whether oseltamivir is effective is uncertain. We conducted this study to understand the real-world situation in northern China and the clinical efficacy for patients with IFV infection after the use of oseltamivir. Methods: The longitudinal study was performed on influenza-like illness (ILI) cases in a tertiary general hospital in Beijing, China during the flu season of 2018–2019. All ILI cases (≥18 years) were recruited into the study. We analyzed the effect of the oseltamivir therapy on the number of clinic visits, hospitalization frequency, and the duration of fever and cough. Results: A total of 689 ILI patients were recruited in this study with 355 in the oseltamivir therapy group and 334 in the supportive therapy group. Among the ILI patients, 388 patients were detected for IFV infection (364 IFV-A and 24 IFV-B) and divided into two groups with or without the oseltamivir therapy (302 vs. 86). There were no significant differences in the basic characteristics between the oseltamivir and supportive therapy groups in the ILI patients or in the IFV positive patients (all p < 0.05). After adjusting for the potential confounders, oseltamivir therapy reduced the times of clinic visits in the ILI and IFV positive patients (p = 0.043 and p = 0.011). No effectiveness with oseltamivir therapy was observed in the outcomes of hospitalization frequency, and the duration of fever and cough. Conclusion: Oseltamivir use may reduce the times of clinic visits. However, we did not observe the differences in the duration of fever, cough, and the frequency of hospitalization between oseltamivir therapy and supportive therapy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Taken polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in a relocated coke and chemical plant in Beijing for example, the procedures of contaminated site health risk assessment adopted in China were introduced, and potential risk control and mitigation alternatives were proposed. The hazard indentification results revealed that the surface soil was heavily polluted by fluorene, phenanthrene, anthracene, fluoranthene, pyrene, benz[a]anthracene, chrysene, benzo[b,k]fluoranthene, benzo[a]pyrene, indeno[1,2,3-cd]pyrene, dibenz[a,h]anthracene, and benzo[g,h,i]perylene throughout the site, and their maximum concentrations were all beyond the corresponding screening levels. But based on the exact exposure characteristics of the receptors in each sub-area, the risk assessment results indicated that only the cancer risk from benz[a]anthracene, benzo[b,k]fluoranthene, benzo[a]pyrene, indeno[1,2,3-cd]pyrene and dibenz[a,h]anthracene were unacceptable, among which the cancer risk from benzo[a]pyrene was the highest, up to 4.4×10-5 in zone A, 2.0×10-4 in zone B and 4.0×10-4 in zone C, which were proposed to be redeveloped as commercial zone, industrial site park, and comprehensive development zone, respectively. In addition, for all contaminants in the three sub-areas, oral ingestion and dermal contact were the two most important exposure pathways. According to the results, an active remediation alternative aiming at decontaminating the polluted soil, a soft strategy aiming at cutting off the exposure pathways and a strategy aiming at changing the exposure characteristic of the receptors through land function change were proposed as the management strategy for the site to mitigate and control the health risk. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Although leukemic blast cells of Pro-B cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) are arrested at the same stage of B cell differentiation, the immature B cell subtype is still biologically heterogeneous and is associated with diverse outcomes. This study aimed to explore the clinical-biological characteristics of pediatric pro-B ALL and factors associated with outcomes. Methods: This study enrolled 121 pediatric patients aged 6 months to 14 years with newly diagnosed CD19+CD10− pro-B cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia (pro-B ALL) treated at Beijing Children's Hospital from March 2003 to October 2018. Genetic abnormalities, immunophenotypic markers, minimal residual disease (MRD) at early treatment stage and long-term outcomes of children treated on two consecutive protocols were analyzed. Results: KMT2A rearrangements were the most frequent abnormalities (incidence rate 33.06%), and were associated with lower frequency of CD13, CD33, CD22 and CD34 expression and higher frequency of CD7 and NG2 expression. Higher frequency of CD15 and CD133 expression was found in KMT2A-AFF1+ patients, exclusively. Presence of CD15 and absence of CD34 at diagnosis correlated with the high burden of MRD at the early stage of treatment. Outcomes were more favorable in patients older than 1 year, with absence of CD20 expression and KMT2A rearrangements, and with MRD lower than 1% at the end of induction and 0.1% before consolidation. Increased intensity of chemotherapy based on MRD analysis did not improve outcomes significantly (5-year EFS 73.9 ± 6.5% for BCH-2003 and 76.1 ± 5.3% for CCLG-2008, P = 0.975). Independent adverse prognostic factors were MRD ≥ 0.1% before consolidation and presence of KMT2A gene rearrangements (odds ratios [ORs] 9.424 [95% confidence interval (CI) 3.210, 27.662; P < 0.001]; 4.142 [1.535, 11.715, P = 0.005]; respectively). Conclusions: Pediatric pro-B ALL is a heterogeneous disease. Genetic analysis and MRD evaluation can predict patients with dismal prognosis; however, intensive chemotherapy alone does not improve outcomes of these patients and targeted therapy or hematopoietic stem cell transplantation may be required. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• A mild chemical extraction technology was employed to measure the rapid desorption fraction of PAHs in soils. • Remediation goals incorporating bioaccessibility and probabilistic analysis were obtained. • Refined remediation goals reduce the remedial volume and CO2 emission greatly. • Oral ingestion acts as the predominant contributor to exposure risk of humans. Incorporating bioaccessibility into human health risk assessment is recognized as a valid way to reduce the conservative properties of conventional results, where the total concentration of a contaminant analysed by exhaustive chemical extraction is applied. Taking a coke production site in Beijing as an example, a mild chemical extraction technology was employed to profile the bioaccessibility of benzo[a]pyrene (BaP), indeno[1,2,3-cd]pyrene (IcP) and dibenz[ah]anthracene (DBA) in soils. The results that were regressed using two bi-phase desorption models (Karickhoff and Weibull) revealed that the rapid desorption fractions of BaP, IcP and DBA, which are taken for bioaccessible fractions, were basically less than half of the total contents in the soils. Probabilistic analysis (PA) was carried out with pre-set distributions of the exposure parameters to characterize the uncertainty in the assessment. The results incorporating bioaccessibility and PA were several times higher than the generic remediation goals which equal to national screening levels, and orders of magnitude higher than the baselines of the region and nation. The results of the Weibull fit were finally recommended as site-specific remediation goals (SSRGs) (10.59 mg/kg, 95.48 mg/kg and 9.24 mg/kg). Over-remediation was avoided while contributing to considerable economic and environmental benefits. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]