Clinical significance of serum interleukin 6 in elderly patients infected with severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 omicron variant and its correlation with underlying diseases.

Objective To investigate the clinical significance of serum interleukin 6 (IL-6) in elderly patients infected with severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) omicron variant and its correlation with underlying diseases. Methods A total of 22 elderly patients (80 years old) infected with omicron variant, who were admitted to Department of Infectious Diseases, The First Affiliated Hospital of Naval Medical University (Second Military Medical University) from Apr. to Jun. 2022 and tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 RNA, were included. The level of serum IL-6 was measured by flow cytometry, and the level of serum C reactive protein (CRP) was measured by immunonephelometry. Patients were divided into pneumonia group (16 cases) and non-pneumonia group (6 cases) according to the imaging examination results, and were divided into severe group (severe and critical type, 5 cases) and non-severe group (mild and normal type, 17 cases) according to the condition. Binary logistic regression model and receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve were used to analyze the correlation between serum IL-6 and CRP levels and the severity of the disease and whether it would progress to pneumonia. Meanwhile, the relationships between underlying diseases and serum IL-6 level were explored. Results Among the 22 patients, 6 were mild, 11 were normal, 3 were severe, and 2 were critical. The baseline serum IL-6 level in the pneumonia group was significantly higher than that in the non-pneumonia group (20.16+/-12.36pg/mL vs 5.42+/-1.57 pg/mL, P=0.009), and there was no significant difference in baseline serum CRP level between the 2 groups (P0.05). There were no significant differences in baseline serum IL-6 or CRP levels between the severe group and the non-severe group (both P0.05). Logistic regression analysis showed that the baseline serum IL-6 and CRP might be related to pneumonia after infection with omicron variant (odds ratio OR=2.407, 95% confidence interval CI0.915-6.328;OR=1.030, 95% CI 0.952-1.114). ROC curve analysis showed that the area under curve values of serum IL-6 and CRP in predicting the progression to pneumonia were 0.969 (95% CI 0.900-1.000) and 0.656 (95% CI 0.380-0.932), respectively, with statistical significance (Z=2.154, P=0.030). There were no significant differences in the baseline serum IL-6 level or proportions of severe patients or pneumonia patients among patients with or without hypertension, diabetes mellitus, coronary heart disease, chronic kidney disease or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (all P0.05). The baseline serum IL-6 levels of the omicron variant infected elderly patients with 1, 2, and 3 or more underlying diseases were 12.50 (9.15, 21.75), 23.55 (9.63, 50.10), and 10.90 (5.20, 18.88) pg/mL, respectively, with no statistical significance (P0.05). Conclusion For omicron variant infected patients, serum IL-6 level is significantly increased in patients with pneumonia manifestations and is correlated with disease progression. Serum IL-6 level is of great guiding significance to judge disease progression and evaluate efficacy and prognosis of elderly coronavirus disease 2019 patients.Copyright © 2022, Second Military Medical University Press. All rights reserved.

Investigating changes in longitudinal associations between declining bus ridership, bus service, and neighborhood characteristics

Amid the recent transit ridership decline, gaining an understanding of the factors affecting ridership becomes crucial for transit agencies to utilize limited resources effectively. I use generalized linear multilevel negative binomial models to investigate the longitudinal relationship and changes in the associations between neigh-borhood-level bus ridership and a series of socio-economic and bus service factors in Philadelphia between 2014 and 2018. Data come from passenger boarding at bus stops in Philadelphia. Results show that the associations between bus ridership, population and the number of jobs, and the percent of zero-car households are positive, but weakened over time. The associations between ridership and bus service supply are inelastic. The findings have implications on transit agencies' resource allocation and service adjustments as they recover from the ridership and revenue losses during the COVID-19 pandemic while facing competition from new travel options such as Uber and Lyft.

Clinical significance of serum interleukin 6 in elderly patients infected with severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 omicron variant and its correlation with underlying diseases

Objective To investigate the clinical significance of serum interleukin 6 (IL-6) in elderly patients infected with severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) omicron variant and its correlation with underlying diseases. Methods A total of 22 elderly patients (>80 years old) infected with omicron variant, who were admitted to Department of Infectious Diseases, The First Affiliated Hospital of Naval Medical University (Second Military Medical University) from Apr. to Jun. 2022 and tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 RNA, were included. The level of serum IL-6 was measured by flow cytometry, and the level of serum C reactive protein (CRP) was measured by immunonephelometry. Patients were divided into pneumonia group (16 cases) and non-pneumonia group (6 cases) according to the imaging examination results, and were divided into severe group (severe and critical type, 5 cases) and non-severe group (mild and normal type, 17 cases) according to the condition. Binary logistic regression model and receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve were used to analyze the correlation between serum IL-6 and CRP levels and the severity of the disease and whether it would progress to pneumonia. Meanwhile, the relationships between underlying diseases and serum IL-6 level were explored. Results Among the 22 patients, 6 were mild, 11 were normal, 3 were severe, and 2 were critical. The baseline serum IL-6 level in the pneumonia group was significantly higher than that in the non-pneumonia group ([20.16+/-12.36]pg/mL vs [5.42+/-1.57] pg/mL, P=0.009), and there was no significant difference in baseline serum CRP level between the 2 groups (P>0.05). There were no significant differences in baseline serum IL-6 or CRP levels between the severe group and the non-severe group (both P>0.05). Logistic regression analysis showed that the baseline serum IL-6 and CRP might be related to pneumonia after infection with omicron variant (odds ratio [OR]=2.407, 95% confidence interval [CI]0.915-6.328;OR=1.030, 95% CI 0.952-1.114). ROC curve analysis showed that the area under curve values of serum IL-6 and CRP in predicting the progression to pneumonia were 0.969 (95% CI 0.900-1.000) and 0.656 (95% CI 0.380-0.932), respectively, with statistical significance (Z=2.154, P=0.030). There were no significant differences in the baseline serum IL-6 level or proportions of severe patients or pneumonia patients among patients with or without hypertension, diabetes mellitus, coronary heart disease, chronic kidney disease or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (all P>0.05). The baseline serum IL-6 levels of the omicron variant infected elderly patients with 1, 2, and 3 or more underlying diseases were 12.50 (9.15, 21.75), 23.55 (9.63, 50.10), and 10.90 (5.20, 18.88) pg/mL, respectively, with no statistical significance (P>0.05). Conclusion For omicron variant infected patients, serum IL-6 level is significantly increased in patients with pneumonia manifestations and is correlated with disease progression. Serum IL-6 level is of great guiding significance to judge disease progression and evaluate efficacy and prognosis of elderly coronavirus disease 2019 patients.Copyright © 2022, Second Military Medical University Press. All rights reserved.

FRD: Few-shot rumor detection for the novel coronavirus pneumonia epidemic

With the full arrival of the digital era, fueled by both information technology and business marketing, rumors are produced and spread endlessly on social networks. During the recent novel coronavirus pneumonia epidemic, online rumors have continued to flourish. Most existing studies on traditional rumor detection rely on a large number of features in practical applications. However, the current severe epidemic scenarios have limited rumor information features, and it remains a challenging problem to detect epidemic rumors with high accuracy using only limited information. As a result, we propose a novel Few-shot Rumor Detection model (FRD) for the novel coronavirus pneumonia, which is combined with meta-learning to be able to accurately identify rumors as soon as possible in crises. Specifically, we started by using the BERT+BiLSTM combination for rumor text feature extraction and representation to generate the historical rumor sample-wise vector and epidemic rumor sample-wise vector;secondly, the prototypical network was introduced to summarize the historical rumor data, and the feature vectors of samples belonging to the same category were averaged to obtain the prototype representation of historical rumor category;finally, we utilize the modified cosine similarity measure function to calculate the distance between the class-wise vector of historical rumor text and the sample-wise vector of epidemic rumor, and complete the rumor detection according to the nearest neighbor method. Our experimental results on English datasets show that the FRD rumor detection model proposed in this paper is superior to other baseline algorithms in terms of accuracy, precision, recall and macro F1 value. From the comparison of experimental results, the FRD model can effectively improve conventional rumor detection methods, and better realize the early detection of sudden epidemic rumors. © 2022 IEEE.

Stocking up and stocking out: Food retail stock-outs, consumer demand, and prices during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020

Monitoring food retail stock-outs or the unplanned unavailability of certain food items for purchase assists policymakers in responding to food supply chain disruptions. This study focuses on identifying food stock-outs using store-level scanner data on US grocery store sales during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. The total median stock-out rates of fixed-weight items increased by approximately 130% after March 15, 2020. Categories such as meat and poultry products, some convenience and frozen foods, baby formula, and carbonated beverages had the highest stock-out rates. The analysis also explores the relationship between stock-out rates, sales increases, and food prices during the pandemic. Published 2023. This article is a U.S. Government work and is in the public domain in the USA.

Molecular Docking and Dynamics of Phytochemicals From Chinese Herbs With SARS-CoV-2 RdRp

The novel Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) is causing coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. Ancient Chinese herbal formulas are effective for diseases caused by viral infection, and their effects on COVID-19 are currently being examined. To directly evaluate the role of Chinese herbs in inhibiting replication of SARS-CoV-2, we investigated how the phytochemicals from Chinese herbs interact with the viral RNA-dependent RNA polymerase (RdRP). Total 1025 compounds were screened, and then 181compounds were selected for molecular docking analysis. Four phytochemicals licorice glycoside E, diisooctyl phthalate, (-)-medicocarpin, and glycyroside showed good binding affinity with RdRp. The best complex licorice glycoside E/RdRp forms 3 hydrogen bonds, 4 hydrophobic interactions, 1 pair of Pi-cation/stacking, and 4 salt bridges. Furthermore, docking complexes licorice glycoside E/RdRp and diisooctyl phthalate/RdRp were optimized by molecular dynamics simulation to obtain the stable conformation. These studies indicate that they are promising as antivirals against SARS-CoV-2.Copyright © The Author(s) 2022.

Metaverse Virtual Social Center for the Elderly Communication During the Social Distancing

The lack of social activities in the elderly for physical reasons can make them feel lonely and prone to depression. With the spread of COVID-19, it is difficult for the elderly to conduct the few social activities stably, causing the elderly to be more lonely. The metaverse is a virtual world that mirrors reality. It allows the elderly to get rid of the constraints of reality and perform social activities stably and continuously, providing new ideas for alleviating the loneliness of the elderly. Through the analysis of the needs of the elderly, a virtual social center framework for the elderly was proposed in this study. Besides, a prototype system was designed according to the framework. The elderly can socialize in virtual reality with metaverse-related technologies and human-computer interaction tools. Additionally, a test was jointly conducted with the chief physician of the geriatric rehabilitation department of a tertiary hospital. The results demonstrated that the mental state of the elderly who had used the virtual social center was significantly better than that of the elderly who had not used it. Thus, virtual social centers alleviated loneliness and depression in older adults. Virtual social centers can help the elderly relieve loneliness and depression when the global epidemic is normalizing and the population is aging. Hence, they have promotion value © 2022 Beijing Zhongke Journal Publishing Co. Ltd

Experts proposal and frequently asked questions of rapid screening and prevention of novel coronavirus pneumonia in children.

The outbreak of novel coronavirus pneumonia (NCP) has become the most severe public health issue at the moment, threatening people's lives. Pediatricians in Shanghai have recently launched a discussion on the focused questions of NCP, including the incidence situation, epidemiological features, essentials of early screening, treatment and nosocomial infection prevention of children's novel coronavirus infection (2019-nCoV), and further put forward the experts proposal upon the patterns of disease occurrence, development, diagnosis and control, for the reference of frontline pediatricians.Copyright © 2020 by the Chinese Medical Association.

How does natural resource dependence influence carbon emissions? The role of environmental regulation

Sustainable economic development and green recovery in the post-COVID-19 era in China requires consideration of natural resource dependence (NRD) and environmental regulation (ER) of CO2 emissions. Based on panel data covering 2008 and 2018 in China, this paper explores the impacts of NRD on carbon emissions and the moderating role of ER. In addition, the heterogeneity, asymmetry, and mediating mechanism are investigated in this study. Following are the main conclusions: (1) Decreasing the dependence on natural resources and strengthening ER can effectively cut down CO2 emissions, and the enhanced ER can reduce the contribution of NRD to CO2 emissions;(2) the positive influence of NRD on carbon emissions are consistent in various regions, while the influence of ER on CO2 emissions is negative in areas with high levels of NRD;(3) the reduced natural resources dependence can accelerate the carbon emissions reduction process indirectly by causing a reduction in China's total energy demand and coal consumption and accelerating the green technological innovation. The findings present several policy recommendations for achieving carbon emissions reduction.

[Clinical characteristics of children infected with SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant combined with allergic disease].

Objective: To investigate the clinical characteristics of children with allergic diseases suffering from SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant strains. Methods: This was a cross-sectional study. A total of 43 pediatric patients with allergic diseases infected by SARS-CoV-2 from April 25, 2022 to June 8, 2022 in Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine were selected as the allergic disease group, while 114 cases without underlying diseases and 16 cases with other underlying diseases were selected as control groups diagnosed at the same period. Clinical data including clinical features, laboratory tests, duration of hospitalization, and the time to negative turn of novel coronavirus nucleic acid were collected and analysed. Kruskal-Wallis H test, chi-square test or Fisher exact test were used for comparison among three groups. Results: Among the 43 patients with allergic diseases, 28 were males and 15 were females, with an age of 4.4 (2.1, 8.2) years on admission, including 32 mild cases and 11 common cases. The allergic disease group included 20 cases (46.5%) of atopic dermatitis and eczema, followed by 14 cases (32.6%) of rhinitis, 8 cases (18.6%) of food allergies, 7 cases (16.3%) of asthma, 4 cases (9.3%) of allergic conjunctivitis and 2 cases (4.7%) of drug allergy. Among the 114 cases without underlying diseases, 57 were males and 57 were females, with an age of 2.8 (1.2, 5.6) years on admission, including 93 mild cases and 21 common cases. Among the 16 cases with other underlying diseases, 9 were males and 7 were females, with an age of 3.0 (2.6, 10.8) years on admission, including 13 cases mild and 3 cases common cases. Children with allergic diseases had higher frequency of sore throat and vomiting than those without underlying diseases (10 cases (23.3%) vs.9 cases (7.9%), 14 cases (32.6%) vs. 11 cases (9.6%), χ²=6.93, 12.24, both P<0.05). The lymphocyte count of patients with allergic disease was lower than those without underlying disease (1.1 (0.7,1.7)×109 vs. 1.6 (1.1,2.7)×109/L, H=-28.00,P=0.005). There were no significant differences in age, gender, typing of SARS-CoV-2, the duration of hospitalization, cycle threshold values of SARS-CoV-2 and the time to negative turn of novel coronavirus nucleic acid among the three groups (all P>0.05). Conclusions: Children with allergic diseases may suffer from sore throat and vomiting more frequently when infected with SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant. The combination of allergic diseases hardly influenced the disease course of SARS-CoV-2 in children.

Co-Archiving a Ballet Repertory Course during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Archiving is a process of organizing and creating content for sustainable, long-term access. However, the “archivists” actively shape the content in the realm of the performing arts, which often involves adding a new layer of knowledge to the original artform. This article explores the archiving of a ballet repertory course conducted in a higher education institution in Hong Kong during the pandemic, including the archival product and the collaborative process between a multidisciplinary team of people from dance, education, and library science. While teaching repertory online has its challenges, being “online” also offered unique learning experiences. Aiming to illustrate the topics related to hybrid pedagogy and individual creativity in use during the pandemic, the team conducted interviews with some participants for the purpose of creating a series of short educational films. These materials were collected and stored in the institution’s digital repository as the first archive for a specific course. © 2022 National Dance Education Organization.

[Characteristics and related factors of viral nucleic acid negative conversion in children infected with Omicron variant strain of SARS-CoV-2].

Objective: To understand the characteristics and associated factors of viral nucleic acid conversion in children infected with Omicron variant strain of SARS-CoV-2 in Shanghai. Methods: The clinical symptoms, laboratory results and other data of 177 children infected with SARS-CoV-2 who were hospitalized in Shanghai Children's Hospital, School of Medicine, Shanghai Jiao Tong University (designated hospital for SARS-CoV-2 infection in Shanghai) from April 25 to June 8, 2022 were retrospectively analyzed. According to the chest imaging findings, the children were divided into mild and common type groups. According to their age, the unvaccinated children were divided into<3 years old group and 3-<18 years old group. According to the vaccination status, the children aged 3-<18 year were divided into non-vaccination group, 1-dose vaccination group and 2-dose vaccination group. Comparison between groups was performed by independent sample t-test and analysis of variance, and multivariate linear regression analysis was used for multivariate analysis. Results: Among the 177 children infected with Omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2, 96 were males and 81 were females, aged 3 (1, 6) years. The time of viral nucleic acid negative conversion was (10.3±3.1) days. The 177 children were 138 cases of mild type and 39 cases of common type. Among the children aged 3-<18 years old, 55 cases were not vaccinated, 5 cases received 1-dose and 36 cases received 2-dose vaccination. Among the 36 children who received 2 doses of vaccination, the time of viral nucleic acid negative conversion was shorter in those vaccinated within 6 months than those over 6 months ((7.1±1.9) vs. (10.8±3.0) d, t=-3.23, P=0.004). Univariate analysis showed that the time of nucleic acid negative conversion of SARS-CoV-2 was associated with age, underlying diseases, gastrointestinal symptoms, white blood cell count, proportion of neutrophils, proportion of lymphocytes, and the number of doses of SARS-CoV-2 vaccine (t=3.87, 2.55, 2.04, 4.24, 3.51, 2.92, F=16.27, all P<0.05). Multiple linear regression analysis showed that older age (ß=-0.33, 95% CI -0.485--0.182, P<0.001) and more doses of vaccination (ß=-0.79, 95% CI -1.463--0.120, P=0.021) were associated with shortened nucleic acid negative conversion time in children, while lower lymphocyte proportion (ß=-0.02, 95% CI -0.044--0.002, P=0.031) and underlying diseases (ß=1.52, 95% CI 0.363-2.672, P=0.010) were associated with prolonged nucleic acid negative conversion time in children. Conclusion: The children infected with Omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2 with reduced lymphocyte proportion and underlying diseases may have longer time of viral nucleic acid negative conversion,while children with older age and more doses of vaccination may have shorter time of viral nucleic acid negative conversion.

[COVID-19 treated with oral Nirmatrelvir-Ritonavir in 3 children].

Objective: To summarize the application experience and the therapeutic effect of Nirmatrelvir-Ritonavir (trade name: Paxlovid) for COVID-19 in children. Methods: A retrospective analysis was performed on the clinical data, including collecting the clinical manifestations and clinical outcomes, dynamically monitoring the blood routine, hepatic and renal function and SARS-CoV-2 nucleic acid results, and observing the related side effects during the treatment, etc, of 3 cases with COVID-19 treated with Paxlovid admitted to Shanghai Children's Hospital (designated referral hospital for SARS-CoV-2 infection in Shanghai) from May 1st to June 1st, 2022. Results: The 3 cases were 12, 14, 17 years of age, among which 2 cases were males, 1 case was female. All 3 cases were mild cases with underlying diseases and risk of developing into severe COVID-19, with symptoms of high fever, sore throat and dry cough. The treatment of Paxlovid at 3rd day of symptom onset contributed to the symptom-free after 1-2 days and negative results of SARS-CoV-2 nucleic acid after 2-4 days. All patients had no adverse manifestations of gastrointestinal tract and nervous system but a case had little skin rashes, which recovered after the withdrawal of Paxlovid. Three cases had normal hepatic and renal function during the Paxlovid treatment. At 3 months after discharge, no clinical manifestations of post-COVID syndrome were found in all 3 cases. Conclusion: Paxlovid was effective and relatively safe in the treatment of 3 children with COVID-19.

Project communication management of the National Medical Center Construction based on OODA loop in response to COVID-19 prevention and control

Objective: According to the need and practice of the National Medical Center Construction, this study structures the project communication management framework of the National Medical Center Construction based on Boyd/OODA loop and describes its background and practical path so as to explore its implementation efficiency. Methods: The theoretical framework was constructed and applied by means of lessons learned and case analysis. Results: The framework can meet various needs of project communication management of the National Medical Center Construction at different stages of epidemic prevention and control. Conclusion: The framework can improve the effectiveness, systematicness, coordination and efficiency of the National Medical Center Construction, and provide theoretical and empirical underpinning. Considerably more innovative and interdisciplinary research is needed in communication management.

Analysis on the Trend of Environmental Development of Smart City in China

As the impact of COVID-19 continues, the "New infrastructure" initiative is stepping up, bringing both opportunities and challenges to smart city development. During the 14th Five-Year Plan period, the construction of smart city in China will be guided by the requirements of modernization of national governance, based on the needs, combined with the characteristics of urban capabilities, conform to the development trend of information technology, deepen digital infrastructure, improve service level, accelerate data governance, and build collaborative mechanism. © 2021 Kriedt Enterprises Ltd. All Rights Reserved.

Development and Effectiveness of a Novel Augmented Reality Self-training Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation Environment during COVID-19 Pandemic: A Protocol of Randomized Controlled Trail

General cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) training rate in China is less than 1%. AR may represent a powerful instrument for CPR training especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. A two-arms, prospective, parallel, 1:1 randomized clinical trial was designed. Participants will recruit via social media advertisements from August to October 2021 in Beijing and randomized into AR self-training CPR group and instructor-led training group. With the guide of immersive multi-sensory AR self-training CPR environment in Hololens step by step, participants in AR group should try their best to perform 10 minutes hands-only CPR to simulate an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest and 15 minutes self-training of CPR and AED by Hololens after rest. Instructor-led group will perform continuous 10 minutes CPR with the similar simulation environment with the oral guide of certified instructor. And a 15 minutes face-to-face instructor-led training CPR and AED training are performed after rest. 2-min CPR skill assessment are conducted both in two groups after intervention immediately, 3 months and 6 months. Meanwhile, CPR quality, include mean, per minute and per cycle (chest compression 30 times) chest compression depth (cm) and rate (minute-1), real-time CPR performance score and compression accuracy will be measured. 2-sample t-test or Mann-Whitney U tests and c2 or Fisher exact tests will be used to analyze the data. When the crowd can't gather, the study may have important implications for improving CPR training rate in China with a large population. This trial has registered in https://www.chictr.org.cn/ on 28 July, 2021with unique identifier: ChiCTR2100049254. © 2021 ACM.

Intelligent Mobile Body Temperature Monitoring Management System for Nursing Home

Public health security is a common challenge facing all mankind and requires efforts from worldwide countries. Since the beginning of 2020, the sudden outbreak of the COVID-19 has affected everyone around the world. Thermometers have played a crucial role in the fight against the pandemic. For example, public places like airports and stations are all equipped with necessary temperature-measuring devices such as medical thermometers, infrared ear thermometers, and thermal imagers. Traditional mercury thermometers not only easily break, but also take a long time to measure body temperature and are difficult to read. As staffers need to be assigned to measure people's temperature, infrared ear thermometers and thermal imagers increase the chances of cross infection and are unable to provide real-time and continuous data, making temperature monitoring and management during the pandemic much more difficult. This paper will introduce an intelligent mobile body temperature monitoring and management system (IMBTMMS) particularly designed for nursing homes. Besides monitoring body temperature on a real-time and continuous basis, the system also provides heart rate and blood oxygen data and intelligently recommends relaxing music solutions. The sensor pad is connected to the mobile app via Bluetooth, with the server on the cloud integrated with an advanced artificial intelligence (AI) algorithm. By regularly processing body temperature, heart rate, and blood oxygen data, the system offers real-time and continuous monitoring, forecasting, warning, and management services. Targeting at use in nursing home, the system enables large-scale monitoring and management, which greatly eases the shortage of manpower during the pandemic and reduces the risk of cross infection. Finally, the system is highly extendable as it can be connected with offline and online medical services, which can be customized as per different demands. © 2021 IEEE.