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In recent years, China's industrial economy has grown rapidly and steadily. Concurrently, carbon emissions have gradually increased, among which agricultural production is an important source of greenhouse gas emissions. It is necessary to reduce agricultural carbon emissions by improving their efficiency to achieve the global goal of peak carbon dioxide emissions in 2030. From a dynamic and static point of view, this study puts agricultural carbon emissions into the evaluation index system of agricultural carbon emission efficiency and analyzes the agricultural carbon emission efficiency and its influencing factors in Hubei Province. First, the unexpected output Slacks-based measure (SBM) model in data envelopment analysis was used to evaluate the agricultural carbon emission efficiency of Hubei Province in 2018 and compared it with other provinces horizontally. Second, the Malmquist–Luenberger index was used to analyze the comprehensive efficiency of agricultural carbon emissions in Hubei Province from 2004 to 2018. The role of technological progress and technical efficiency change in the development of low-carbon agriculture in Hubei Province was analyzed. The results showed that agricultural production efficiency in Hubei Province improved from 2004 to 2018, and the overall level was slightly higher than the average level in China. However, agriculture has not eliminated the extensive development modes of high input, low efficiency, high emission, and high pollution. The efficiency of technological progress in agricultural resource utilization in Hubei Province was close to the optimal level. The improvement space was small. Hence, the low efficiency of agricultural technology is a key factor restricting the improvement of agricultural production efficiency. The results provide a reference for low-carbon agricultural policy formulation and expand the policy choice path. This has practical significance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is an emerging infectious disease that first manifested in humans in Wuhan, Hubei Province, China, in December 2019, and has subsequently spread worldwide. Methods We conducted a retrospective, single-center case series of the seven maintenance hemodialysis (HD) patients infected with COVID-19 at Zhongnan Hospital of Wuhan University from 13 January to 7 April 2020 and a proactive search of potential cases by chest computed tomography (CT) scans. Results Of 202 HD patients, 7 (3.5%) were diagnosed with COVID-19. Five were diagnosed by reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) because of compatible symptoms, while two were diagnosed by RT-PCR as a result of screening 197 HD patients without respiratory symptoms by chest CT. Thirteen of 197 patients had positive chest CT features and, of these, 2 (15%) were confirmed to have COVID-19. In COVID-19 patients, the most common features at admission were fatigue, fever and diarrhea [5/7 (71%) had all these]. Common laboratory features included lymphocytopenia [6/7 (86%)], elevated lactate dehydrogenase [3/4 (75%)], D-dimer [5/6 (83%)], high-sensitivity C-reactive protein [4/4 (100%)] and procalcitonin [5/5 (100%)]. Chest CT showed bilateral patchy shadows or ground-glass opacity in the lungs of all patients. Four of seven (57%) received oxygen therapy, one (14%) received noninvasive and invasive mechanical ventilation, five (71%) received antiviral and antibacterial drugs, three (43%) recieved glucocorticoid therapy and one (14%) received continuous renal replacement therapy. As the last follow-up, four of the seven patients (57%) had been discharged and three patients were dead. Conclusions Chest CT may identify COVID-19 patients without clear symptoms, but the specificity is low. The mortality of COVID-19 patients on HD was high. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Information on the association between tea drinking and semen quality is limited. Little is reported on whether tea drinking is benefit to sperm quality. This cross-sectional and longitudinal study was conducted between April 2017 and July 2018. Participants were healthy men who were screened as potential sperm donors recruited at the Hubei Province Human Sperm Bank of China. A structured questionnaires containing sociodemographic information, daily habits, sperm collection-related information was completed for each participant at interview. Repeated semen samples were taken to examine the sperm parameters, including sperm volume, sperm concentration, sperm count, progressive motility, and total motility. A total of 1385 men with 6466 sperm samples were included in this study. Two groups were compared: tea drinking men (389, 28.1%) and non-tea drinking men (996, 71.9%). Compared with subjects who never drink tea, the analyses showed that sperm concentration and total sperm count were higher in tea-consuming subjects. A 10-year period or more duration of tea drinking significantly increased semen concentrations by 16.27% (P < 0.05). Sperm concentration was increased in subjects with a frequency of tea drinking of 3 days or more per week (P < 0.05) or, among men who were occasional alcohol drinkers, when tea concentration was weak (P < 0.05). No evidence of trend effects (P for trend > 0.05) or interaction effects (P for interaction > 0.05) between tea consumption and sperm quality, respectively. Our findings provide evidence that tea drinking may improve male reproductive health. Long-term, frequent, weak tea drinking tends to increase sperm quality among men with low BMI or health-related behaviors like smoking or alcohol intake. [Display omitted] • Long-term of tea drinking significantly increased sperm concentration. • Frequent of tea drinking was associated with a higher sperm count in occasional alcohols consumers. • Frequent of tea drinking was associated with a higher progressive sperm motility in occasional alcohols consumers. • Weak tea drinking was associated with greater total sperm count among occasional alcohols consumers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]