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BACKGROUND The pan-European VACCELERATE network aims to implement the first transnational harmonized and sustainable vaccine trial Volunteer Registry, being a single entry point for potential volunteers of large-scale vaccine trials across Europe. This work exhibits a set of harmonized vaccine trial–related educational and promotional tools for the general public, designed and disseminated by the pan-European VACCELERATE network. OBJECTIVE This study primarily aimed to design and develop a standard toolkit to increase positive attitudes and access to trustworthy information for better access and increased recruitment to vaccine trials for the public. More specifically, the produced tools are focused on inclusiveness and equity, and are targeting different population groups, including underserved ones, as potential volunteers for the VACCELERATE Volunteer Registry (older individuals, migrants, children, and adolescents). The promotional and educational material is aligned with the main objectives of the Volunteer Registry to increase public literacy and awareness regarding vaccine-related clinical research or trials and trial participation, including informed consent and legal issues, side effects, and frequently asked questions regarding vaccine trial design. METHODS Tools were developed per the aims and principles of the VACCELERATE project, focusing on trial inclusiveness and equity, and are adjusted to local country-wise requirements to improve public health communication. The produced tools are selected based on the cognitive theory, inclusiveness, and equity of differently aged and underrepresented groups, and standardized material from several official trustworthy sources (eg, COVID-19 Vaccines Global Access; the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control; the European Patients’ Academy on Therapeutic Innovation; Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance; and the World Health Organization). A team of multidisciplinary specialists (infectious diseases, vaccine research, medicine, and education) edited and reviewed the subtitles and scripts of the educational videos, extended brochures, interactive cards, and puzzles. Graphic designers selected the color palette, audio settings, and dubbing for the video story-tales and implemented QR codes. RESULTS This study presents the first set of harmonized promotional and educational materials and tools (ie, educational cards, educational and promotional videos, extended brochures, flyers, posters, and puzzles) for vaccine clinical research (eg, COVID-19 vaccines). These tools inform the public about possible benefits and disadvantages of trial participation and build confidence among participants about the safety and efficacy of COVID-19 vaccines and the health care system. This material has been translated into several languages and is intended to be freely and easily accessible to facilitate dissemination among VACCELERATE network participant countries and the European and global scientific, industrial, and public community. CONCLUSIONS The produced material could help fill knowledge gaps of health care personnel, providing the appropriate future patient education for vaccine trials, and tackling vaccine hesitancy and parents’ concerns for potential participation of children in vaccine trials.

We show that for any solvable group G and a Drinfel'd twist J, k G J is solvable in the sense of the intrinsic definition of solvability given in [2] . More generally, if a Hopf algebra H has a normal solvable series so does H J . Furthermore, while solvable groups are defined as having certain commutative quotients, quasitriangular normally solvable Hopf algebras have appropriate quantum commutative quotients. We end with a detailed example.

While it is reported that a large part of the mining activity abroad comes from Canada, a robust regulatory framework for addressing human rights violations committed by Canadian mining companies i...

This paper examines the role of the Supreme Court of Canada (SCC) in resolving human rights conflicts and balancing individual and collective rights. With a multiple control mission, the Court must interpret the Constitution and resolve disputes over competing rights and interests, based on the principle of constitutional democracy. This paper specifically focuses on the SCC’s role in conflict resolution in human rights cases, especially in the complex legal framework of protection existing in Canada. It also addresses how the Court’s rulings may affect the protection of fundamental rights under the Canadian Charter, illustrated by some key examples from the Court’s caselaw. To this end, the first part provides a descriptive overview of the complex fabric of human rights protection in the Canadian constitutional framework. The second part discusses the SCC’s role in protecting human rights within the Canadian legal system. Ultimately, this paper underscores the fundamental role of a Supreme Court in protecting human rights in situations of multiple rights conflicts.

Actinobacillus pleuropneumoniae is the etiological agent of porcine pleuropneumonia, a disease of major impact on pig health, welfare, and productivity globally. Serovar 8 (APP) is the predominant clinical serovar in Norway and the United Kingdom (UK), and has been isolated from clinical cases in Denmark. The primary objective of this study was to characterize the genetic variability of isolates of A. pleuropneumoniae APP8 in the Norwegian population. The secondary objectives were to determine the within-host variability of APP8; to compare the APP8 bacterial populations in Norway, Denmark, and the UK, including antimicrobial resistance (AMR) gene profiles and to assess the effect of national differences in antimicrobial drug use and restricted animal movement on the occurrence of resistance. Isolates of APP8 from the UK (n=67), Denmark (n=22), and Norway (n=123) collected between 1983 and 2020 were compared using whole genome sequencing. To investigate genetic variability within individual hosts, an additional 104 APP8 isolates from the lungs of six Norwegian pigs were compared. Very low within-host variation was observed (≤ 2 single nucleotide polymorphisms). The phylogeny of 123 Norwegian APP8 isolates from 76 herds revealed some within-herd genetic variation, but substantial geographical clustering. When inferring the relatedness of the three international APP8 collections, the topology highlighted the existence of two distinct monophyletic branches characterized by the Norwegian and UK isolates, respectively. Three Danish isolates were scattered across the UK branch, whereas the remaining 19 Danish isolates clustered in two monophyletic groups nested in the Norwegian branch. Coalescence analysis, performed to estimate the divergences from a common ancestor, indicated a last common ancestor several centuries ago. The phylogenetic analyses also revealed striking differences in occurrence of AMR genes, as these were 23-times more prevalent among the UK isolates than among the Norwegian isolates. An increased understanding of the effects of population strategies is helpful in surveillance and control of infectious diseases.

To map the public information about COVID-19 vaccines and vaccine trials in Europe, we have compiled an inventory of online communication materials from official sources (e.g., governments, public agencies, and NGOs) via directed online research. While information for the general public was abundant across Europe, we found a large variation in number, type and target audiences among countries. Little or no information was found for population groups that are typically underrepresented in vaccine clinical trials. Materials about clinical trials and trial participation were also limited. Interestingly, higher number of media materials was not reflected in higher national vaccination rates. publishedVersion

This work was supported by a Longer and Larger (LoLa) grant from the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (grant numbers BB/G020744/1, BB/G019177/1, BB/G019274/1, BB/G018553/1, BB/S002103/1, and BB/S005897/1), the UK Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, and Zoetis (formerly Pfizer Animal Health) awarded to the Bacterial Respiratory Diseases of Pigs-1 Technology (BRaDP1T) consortium. Funding for LL provided by the ‘National Natural Science Foundation of China’ (No.31520103917). MTGH and DH were supported by the Wellcome Trust (grant number 098051). We report here the complete genome sequence of the widely studied Actinobacillus pleuropneumoniae serovar 8 reference strain 405, generated using the Pacific Biosciences (PacBio) RS II platform. Furthermore, we compared draft sequences generated by Illumina sequencing of six stocks of this strain, including the same original stock used to generate the PacBio sequence, held in different countries and found little genetic variation, with only three SNPs identified, all within the degS gene. However, sequences of two small plasmids, pARD3079 and p405tetH, detected by Illumina sequencing of the draft genomes were not identified in the PacBio sequence of the reference strain. Publisher PDF

Background Respiratory diseases are major health concerns in the pig production sector worldwide, contributing adversely to morbidity and mortality. Over the past years there was a rise in reported incidents of respiratory disease in pigs in Norway, despite population wide freedom from Aujeszky´s disease, porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome, porcine respiratory corona virus and enzootic pneumonia. The main objective of this study was to investigate acute outbreaks of respiratory disease in conventional Norwegian fattening pig herds. The study included 14 herds. In seven herds with reported outbreaks of acute respiratory disease, data on clinical signs was recorded and samples for laboratory examination were collected. Diagnostic protocols were compared by parallel analysis of clinically healthy pigs from seven non-outbreak herds. Results The most commonly reported clinical signs were sudden deaths and dyspnea. An average compartment morbidity of 60%, mortality of 4% and case fatality of 9% was recorded in the outbreak herds. Post-mortem examinations revealed acute lesions resembling porcine pleuropneumonia in all 28 pigs investigated from the outbreak herds and in 2 of the 24 (8%) pigs from the non-outbreak herds. Chronic lesions were recorded in another 2 pigs (8%) from the non-outbreak herds. Actinobacillus pleuropneumoniae serovar 8 was isolated from lungs and/or pleura from all tested pigs (n = 28) in the outbreak herds, and from 2 out of 24 pigs (8%) in the non-outbreak herds, one pig with an acute and another pig with a chronic infection. No other significant bacterial findings were made. Seroconversion to A. pleuropneumoniae antibodies was detectable in all outbreak herds analyzed and in six out of seven non-outbreak herds, but the risk ratio for seroconversion of individual pigs was higher (risk ratio 2.3 [1.50- 3.43 95% CI; P Conclusion The main etiological pathogen found during acute outbreaks of respiratory disease was A. pleuropneumoniae serovar 8. All pigs from outbreak herds had typical lesions of acute porcine pleuropneumonia, and only A. pleuropneumoniae serovar 8 was identified. Co-infections were not found to impact disease development.

Poor adherence of transfusion-dependent patients to chelation treatment is often the cause of persistent iron overload and ensuing morbidity. However, a tool to assess patient compliance with therapy is lacking in clinical practice. Labile plasma iron (LPI, the redox-active component of non-transferrin bound iron) has been studied as an indicator of systemic iron overload and of chelation efficacy, and may particularly reflect recent iron equilibrium. We considered the use of LPI as a potential indicator for recent chelation treatment in 18 transfusion-dependent pediatric patients. Samples were collected under chelation treatment or after a short interruption of the treatment, and LPI was measured by the FeROS assay (Aferrix, Tel Aviv, Israel). LPI was significantly higher after a short-term interruption of the chelation (median of 0.4 μM off-therapy [range:0-4] vs 0 μM on-therapy [range:0-2.8] (p .001)). Conversely, serum iron, serum ferritin and calculated transferrin saturation were not significantly higher in the "off-therapy" samples compared to "on-therapy". In addition, in multivariate logistic regression analysis LPI was the variable most significantly associated with recent chelation treatment (p = .001). We conclude that LPI could serve as a useful indicator of compliance to chelation therapy.

Since 1947, the Canadian Citizenship Act has set out the laws that determine eligibility for Canadian citizenship. Throughout the Act’s various enactments, the Canadian government has recog...

The flowtime network restoration problem was introduced by Averbakh and Pereira (2012) who presented a Minimum Spanning Tree heuristic, two local search procedures, and an exact branch-and-bound al...

In 1999, the majority of the Supreme Court of Canada held in the case of Dobson (Litigation Guardian of) v. Dobson that public policy concerns indicate that a legal duty of care cannot, and should not, be imposed by the courts upon a pregnant woman towards her foetus or subsequently born alive child. Public policy concerns can in part explain the decision of the Court; however, it also negates the rights of children and disregards their right to a remedy. In arriving at such a decision, the majority of the Court considered comparative law, namely in the United States and the United Kingdom, but surprisingly did not engage in a discussion of international human rights norms. This article aims to fill in this gap by examining international human rights conventions to which Canada is a party that guarantee rights to both (pregnant) women and the born alive child, and how they can inform the debate on maternal tort immunity. By examining international human rights norms applicable in Canada, it become...

We use integrals of left coideal subalgebras to develop Harmonic analysis for semisimple Hopf algebras. We show how $N^*,$ the space of functional on $N,$ is embedded in $H^*.$ We define a bilinear form on $N^*$ and show that irreducible $N$-characters are orthogonal with respect to that form. We then give an explicit formula for induced characters of $N$ and show how the induced characters are embedded in $R(H).$ In the second part we give an intrinsic definition for solvable semisimple Hopf algebras via left coideal subalgebras and their integrals. We show how this definition generalizes solvability for finite groups. In particular, commutative and nilpotent Hopf algebras are solvable. We finally prove an analogue of Burnside theorem: A semisimple quasitriangular Hopf algebras of dimension $p^aq^b$ is solvable., Comment: 22 pages

Canada has been at the forefront of the recognition of human rights, including economic, social and cultural rights (ESC rights) in the international scene. As a party to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, 1 Canada has, over the years, implemented in legislation and case-law some ESC rights such as the right to health, education and social welfare. While ESC rights were not explicitly identified in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, 2 which forms part of the Canadian Constitution, ESC rights in different forms have received some protection in the Canadian legal order. An analysis of the Canadian record with respect to ESC rights demonstrates the immense gap between a glorified image of Canada as an international human rights proponent (the ‘utopia’) and the actual implementation of internationally recognized human rights in Canada (the ‘reality’). As Canada is bound to face major transformational changes to its economy and social fabric in the years to come, the Courts will have to adapt quickly and efficiently to ensure a smooth transition. This paper overviews the evolution of the case-law on ESC rights in Canada in light of its international obligations, and suggests, the relevant ESC rights jurisprudence signals a disconnect with Canada’s international obligation ‘requiring progressive implementation to the maximum of available resources by all appropriate means.’