Search

Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) treatment with antiretroviral regimens containing integrase strand transfer inhibitors such as dolutegravir (DTG) and bictegravir (BIC) offers high levels of protection against the development of drug resistance mutations. Despite this, resistance to DTG and BIC can occur through the development of the R263K integrase substitution.

We examine the impact of life and health insurance spending on subjective well-being. Taking advantage of insurance spending and subjective well-being data on more than 700,000 individuals in Japan, we examine whether insurance spending can buffer declines in subjective well-being due to exposure to mass disaster. We find that insurance spending can buffer drops in subjective well-being by approximately 3–6% among those who experienced the mass disaster of the great East Japan earthquake. Subjective health increases the most, followed by life satisfaction and happiness. On the other hand, insurance spending decreases the subjective well-being of those who did not experience the earthquake by approximately 3–7%. We conclude by monetizing the subjective well-being loss and calculating the extent to which insurance spending can compensate for it. The monetary value of subjective well-being buffered through insurance spending is approximately 33,128 USD for happiness, 33,287 USD for life satisfaction, and 19,597 USD for subjective health for a person in one year. Therefore, we confirm that life/health insurance serves as an ideal option for disaster adaptation. Our findings indicate the importance of considering subjective well-being, which is often neglected when assessing disaster losses.

We review the literature on the motivators of consumers’ purchasing decisions regarding autonomous vehicles (AVs), focusing on environmental awareness, vehicle types, concerns about accidents, and merits. The willingness to buy (WTB) and willingness to pay (WTP) for AVs have been extensively studied. However, it is imperative to broaden the outlook and consolidate the existing knowledge base. Although the WTB and WTP for AVs have been studied, automation-level preferences have been underresearched. Based on more than 150,000 observations, we construct a choice model and calculate the WTP for each level of automation. Our results show that there is a disparity between people's WTB and WTP according to the automation level. In particular, we find that the coefficients regarding FAVs’ benefits and accidents significantly exceed those related to environmental concerns. Such results indicate that practical benefits and concerns influence AV demand and WTP to a greater extent than environmental awareness. Our model results indicate a disparity between WTB and WTP for AVs that mostly derives from the different types of environmental concerns, concerns about accidents, and perceived benefits from these automobiles. Our results urge policies according to which governments and companies closely examine consumers who exhibit WTB-WTP disparities. Issues relating to demand patterns, WTP, and a suitable policy framework are discussed.

Objectives The development of HIV drug resistance against the integrase strand transfer inhibitor dolutegravir is rare. We report here the transient detection, by near full-genome ultradeep sequencing, of minority HIV-1 subtype B variants bearing the S153F and R263K integrase substitutions in the proviral DNA from blood cells of one patient who successfully initiated dolutegravir-based ART, over 24 weeks. Our objective was to study the effects of these substitutions. Methods Strand transfer and DNA-binding activities of recombinant integrase proteins were measured in cell-free assays. Cell-based resistance, infectivity and replicative capacities were measured using molecular clones. Structural modelling was performed to understand experimental results. Results R263K emerged first, followed by the addition of S153F at Week 12. By Week 24, both mutations remained present, but at lower prevalence. We confirmed the coexistence of S153F and R263K on single viral genomes. Combining S153F or S153Y with R263K decreased integration and viral replicative capacity and conferred high levels of drug resistance against all integrase inhibitors. Alone, S153Y and S153F did little to infectivity or dolutegravir resistance. We identified altered DNA binding as a mechanism of resistance. The patient remained with undetectable viral loads at all timepoints. Conclusions Drug-resistant minority variants have often been reported under suppressive ART. Our study adds to these observations by unravelling a progression towards higher levels of resistance through a novel pathway despite continuous undetectable viral loads. Poorly replicative HIV drug-resistant minority proviral variants did not compromise viral suppression in one individual treated with dolutegravir.

Motivated by the global fear of the Coronavirus-19 (COVID-19) pandemic, we investigated whether lockdowns save people from air pollution, notably from Nitrogen Dioxide (NO2). Using daily satellite data from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), we first found that the global NO2 tropospheric vertical column density (TVCD) decreased by 16.5% after the Coronavirus-19 (COVID-19) outbreak. Then, we calculated the global health benefits, as the monetized value of life, using the value of a statistical life (VSL). The total global health benefits were approximately 8.73 trillion USD, accounting for 10% of the global GDP, such benefits would be the largest in China, followed by the United States, Japan and Germany. Our results suggest that lockdowns may bring benefits to countries that policy interventions cannot easily bring, thus highlighting the importance of social distancing.

We investigate the automobile preferences of consumers and evaluate financial incentives designed to promote automobiles of higher fuel economy in Japan from sales data. We explore two different groups of consumers, namely, general consumers and selective consumers, according to their fuel economy preferences. Then we estimate the effectiveness of financial incentives and the price sensitivity of such incentives to different groups of consumers. We use ordered logit, linear regression, and simultaneous equations. Estimates suggest that only tax incentives are effective for general consumers, thereby implying a need to improve Japanese policies.

Reaching carbon neutrality would require the retirement of conventional power sources and substitution with renewable energy sources. Given that immediate substitution from conventional to renewable power sources is not feasible in the status quo, we investigate whether adding residential solar photovoltaic (PV) technology in addition to conventional power sources would reduce residential emissions. We use a large survey dataset of more than 300,000 observations and employ a structural equation model (SEM) to validate our findings. Interestingly, emissions increase by 1.75% if residential PV is adopted, and Japanese citizens with residential PV systems end up using 3.02% more electricity. We also find that pro-environmental consumers may also produce more emissions with PVs. As a result, reaching target carbon reductions in the residential sector would necessitate eliminating conventional energy sources. We address the policy implications for pathways to reduce residential emissions.

We investigate whether the information disclosure of Environmental, Social, Governance (ESG) criteria is more crucial than actions for the financial performance of firms by using two different ratings with more than 1,000,000 samples. Our result shows that disclosure is more important for profits while action is more critical in Tobin’s Q and IVA scores.

As a market for sustainability investing is growing rapidly, understanding the impact of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) activities on firms’ financial performance is becoming increasingly important. In this study, we examine the effect of ESG performance on stock returns and volatility during the financial crisis resulting from the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. To quantify the impact, we use company-level daily ESG score data and United Nations Global Compact (GC) score data. In our dataset, ESG scores indicate ESG performance that is deemed important to financial materiality, and the GC score indicates the firm reputation for following UN rules. Our results indicate that during the pandemic, an increase in the ESG score, especially the E score component, is related to higher returns and lower volatility. Conversely, increasing GC scores is correlated with lower stock returns and higher volatility. In addition, we find that firms in lower return groups benefit more than other firms. Focusing on energy sector impacts, we show that although the non-energy sector benefits more than the energy sector from increasing E scores, energy sector firms can still reduce their stock price volatility by increasing these scores. Our study offers significant implications for ESG investment strategies during financial crises.

Which comes first in reducing the Carbon Dioxide (CO2 ) emissions from the transportation sector: consumer preference or technological advancement? Using a series of discrete-choice demand models, we estimate the demand for automobiles in Japan. Our model explicitly allows consumer preferences for fuel economy to evolve over time, and the estimation results confirm the existence of such a change. We then simulate consumer behavior , enabling consumers in 2010 to choose automobiles from 2016, and vice versa. The results imply that both consumer preferences and technological advancement are important—without technological advancement and increases in consumers’ appreciation for fuel-efficient cars, CO 2 emissions cannot be reduced.

Reducing vehicle travel distances may eventually be a promising option for reducing oil dependence. However, the factors affecting travel distances have not yet been investi-gated, which makes the development of effective transportation-related policy difficult. Therefore, we explore factors influencing travel distances in Japan, namely, income group, region, interest in purchasing a hybrid car, travel purposes, vehicle type, and demographics, using data collected through surveys. Subsequently, we examine whether the factors increasing travel distances also increase fuel usage in the transportation sec-tor. Several findings emerge: First, hybrid ownership is positively correlated to travel distances regardless of income level and interest in purchasing a hybrid car (hybrid interest). Second, income level has a positive relationship with travel distances. How-ever, individuals in the high-income group show negative coefficients towards travel distances. The results also show that factors increasing travel distance also positively affect fuel usage except for hybrid ownership. For example, hybrid ownership is posi-tively correlated with both travel distances and fuel consumption, which is a form of the “green paradox.” Thus, the contribution of this study is that it provides evidence for the existence of direct rebound effects and wealth inequality in travel behavior and indicates the need for implementing policies based on individuals’ socio-demographical identity and type of vehicle ownership.

We investigate whether the contrasting set of transportation policies in Korea---reductions in fuel taxes and increases in diesel automobile prices---has decreased emissions. Using a random-coefficient discrete choice model and hypothetical policy sets, we estimate the automobile demand of consumers, the market share of cars by fuel type, and total emissions, assuming that consumer preferences for driving costs change over time. Then, we separately analyze the effect of each policy set on automobile sales and emissions, particularly carbon dioxide, nitrogen oxide, and particulate matter. Our analyses reveal that Korean consumers have become more sensitive toward fuel costs over time and that the emission consequences of Korean policies depend on consumer preferences.

Highlights • We calculate the global mortality benefits of COVID-19. • Incorporating all actions would save approximately 40.76 trillion USD globally. • Social distancing accounts for 55% of the global mortality benefits. • The monetary benefit would be the largest in the US, Japan and China., The rapid spread of COVID-19 motivated countries worldwide to mitigate mortality through actions including social distancing, home quarantine, school closures, and case isolation. We estimate the global mortality benefits of these actions. We use county-level data on COVID-19 from January 2020, project the number of mortalities until September 2020, and calculate the global mortality benefits using the age- and country-specific value of a statistical life (VSL). Implementing all four types of actions above would save approximately 40.76 trillion USD globally, with social distancing accounting for 55% of the benefits. The monetary benefit would be the largest in the US, Japan and China. Our findings indicate that global actions during COVID-19 have substantial economic benefits and must be implemented in response to COVID-19.

While the fuel economy of Japanese automobiles has improved by 40% in the past decade, gasoline consumption in the transportation sector from 2007 to 2016 only decreased by 4%. We seek to explain this discrepancy by investigating Japanese fuel economy standards and the financial incentives given to consumers of fuel-efficient cars. To do so, this study explores whether Japanese policies caused such a rebound effect, by employing the difference-in-difference framework. We find that these policies contribute to energy rebound effect, by enabling higher fuel consumption at lower costs and thus causing higher energy usages. We provide evidence that policies can increase not only fuel usage but also fuel costs. The main driving force behind the rebound effect is the increase in the sales of hybrid vehicles, induced by financial incentives.