Thailand's COVID-19: How public financial management facilitated effective and accountable health sector responses

Effective Public Financial Management (PFM) systems are crucial during COVID-19 pandemic to ensure timely mobilisation of sufficient resources and distribution to frontline service providers. All aspects of PFM, from budget acquisition to execution and expenditure reporting and auditing are important aspects in pursuing effective pandemic responses with transparency and accountability. This commentary analyzes how PFM in Thailand adapted to support purchasing of COVID-19 health services, including laboratories and treatment, vaccines and vaccination servicing, and no-fault compensation from adverse effects following immunisation. It also discusses the limitations which delay implementation. Financing COVID-19 services was decided by the Cabinet under a State of Emergency Decree, resulting in expedited budget approval process. Though delays in budget execution were caused by bureaucratic budget spending rules, regulations and approvals, PFM adaptation allowed for services to be provided through the use of hospital revenue with rapid budget execution rules and regulations while maintaining accountability, reporting and auditing. Lastly, while reporting is mandatory with internal audit by related government agencies, and external audit by Office of the Auditor General in place, as of September 2021, report of the COVID-19 expenditure in 2020 has yet to be made publicly available for transparency and check and balance by the public. It is unclear the degree to which audit systems are fully enforced. Overall, Thailand's PFM systems have provided rapid fund mobilisation sourcing from central budget and loans and clarity in authorisation of spending;the use of hospital revenue provides more flexibility and rapid budget execution.

Comprehensive Characterization of PVDF Nanofibers at Macro- and Nanolevel.

This study is focused on the characterization and investigation of polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) nanofibers from the point of view of macro- and nanometer level. The fibers were produced using electrostatic spinning process in air. Two types of fibers were produced since the collector speed (300 rpm and 2000 rpm) differed as the only one processing parameter. Differences in fiber's properties were studied by scanning electron microscopy (SEM) with cross-sections observation utilizing focused ion beam (FIB). The phase composition was determined by Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and Raman spectroscopy. The crystallinity was determined by differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), and chemical analysis of fiber's surfaces and bonding states were studied using X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). Other methods, such as atomic force microscopy (AFM) and piezoelectric force microscopy (PFM), were employed to describe morphology and piezoelectric response of single fiber, respectively. Moreover, the wetting behavior (hydrophobicity or hydrophilicity) was also studied. It was found that collector speed significantly affects fibers alignment and wettability (directionally ordered fibers produced at 2000 rpm almost super-hydrophobic in comparison with disordered fibers spun at 300 rpm with hydrophilic behavior) as properties at macrolevel. However, it was confirmed that these differences at the macrolevel are closely connected and originate from nanolevel attributes. The study of single individual fibers revealed some protrusions on the fiber's surface, and fibers spun at 300 rpm had a core-shell design, while fibers spun at 2000 rpm were hollow.

Future antiviral polymers by plasma processing.

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is largely threatening global public health, social stability, and economy. Efforts of the scientific community are turning to this global crisis and should present future preventative measures. With recent trends in polymer science that use plasma to activate and enhance the functionalities of polymer surfaces by surface etching, surface grafting, coating and activation combined with recent advances in understanding polymer-virus interactions at the nanoscale, it is promising to employ advanced plasma processing for smart antiviral applications. This trend article highlights the innovative and emerging directions and approaches in plasma-based surface engineering to create antiviral polymers. After introducing the unique features of plasma processing of polymers, novel plasma strategies that can be applied to engineer polymers with antiviral properties are presented and critically evaluated. The challenges and future perspectives of exploiting the unique plasma-specific effects to engineer smart polymers with virus-capture, virus-detection, virus-repelling, and/or virus-inactivation functionalities for biomedical applications are analysed and discussed.