Psychedelic public health: State of the field and implications for equity.

BACKGROUND: Psychedelic Public Health is an emerging discipline uniting the practices of public health with the potential benefits of psychedelics to reduce harm and promote health, wellness, and equity at community and population levels. Little is known regarding the current state of psychedelic public health despite rising psychedelic usage, evidence of its health efficacy, opening policy environments, and concerns regarding equity and potential harms. METHODS: To characterize the current state of psychedelic public health, this survey reviewed relevant webpages from 228 universities housing accredited Schools and Programs in Public Health (SPPHs) and 59 Psychedelic Research Centers (PRCs) in the US and globally. The scan corresponded to the Prisma 2020 checklist, identifying URLs through keyword searches by Beautiful Soup python package and Google search engine web application. Measures were coded through webpage text analysis. FINDINGS: Fewer than 10% (9.6%) of SPPHs engaged with psychedelics (2.6% substantially), while half (52.6%) of universities engaged (28.1% substantially). Among PRCs, only 10% indicated a collaboration with SPPHs, and fewer than 3% of PRC personnel held public health degrees. PRCs were preponderantly affiliated with medical schools. Although Indigeneity significantly contributes to Western therapeutic psychedelic protocols, only approximately one-quarter of active universities, SPPHs, or PRCs visibly addressed Indigeneity and only one PRC included Indigenous leadership. 92% of PRCs were led or co-led by people characterized as White-European and 88% by men. Only 20-43% of SPPHs, universities, and PRCs visibly addressed social determinants of health. CONCLUSIONS: Public health schools, which train, study, and advise the future of public health, showed limited involvement in the growing psychedelic field, signifying a gap in psychedelic science and practice. The absence of public health's population-level approaches signifies a missed opportunity to maximize benefits and protect against potential harms of psychedelics at community and population levels.

Let-Us Investigate; A Meta-Analysis of Influencing Factors on Lettuce Crop Yields within Controlled-Environment Agriculture Systems.

Climate change-related impacts have hampered the productivity of agricultural lands in recent times, affecting food security globally. Novel technology-based agricultural production systems such as controlled-environment agriculture (CEA) are a way to reduce the impact of climatic variation and pests that harm current global crop production and ensure consistent crop development. These systems often use artificial lighting and soilless mediums to produce crops. This meta-analysis has investigated the key influencing factors on crop production within these systems, using previous studies on lettuce (the most cultivated crop in these systems) to understand what affects yield within CEA. This analysis has found that on average, CEA systems yield twice that of field-based agriculture (3.68 kg m-2 vs. 1.88 kg m-2), with the most influencing factors being the variety of cultivars grown, the season, the nutrient delivery method, and the lighting type. The cultivation time for this study was 40 days, with 94% of papers having trial periods of 70 days or less, much lower than field-based agriculture (60-120 days). Vertical farming (stacked vertical CEA cultivation) studies were found to especially drive up yield per area (6.88 kg m-2). The results of this meta-analysis are useful for starting to understand the key influencing factors on CEA growth and highlight the breadth of research ongoing in the CEA industry.

Validation of N95 respirator models for pressure drop and particle capture efficiency.

Despite efforts to apply administrative and engineering controls to minimize worker exposure to aerosols, filtering facepiece respirators (FFRs) continue to be an important form of personal protective equipment in hard-to-control settings such as healthcare, agriculture, and construction. Optimizing the performance of FFRs can be advanced with the use of mathematical models that incorporate the forces that act on particles during filtration as well as those filter characteristics that influence filter pressure drop. However, a thorough investigation of these forces and characteristics using measurements of currently available FFRs has not been undertaken. Filter characteristics such as fiber diameter and filter depth were measured from samples taken from six currently-available N95 FFRs from three manufacturers. A filtration model was developed that included diffusion, inertial and electrostatic forces to estimate the filtration of an aerosol with a Boltzmann charge distribution. The diameter of the filter fibers was modeled as either a single "effective" diameter or as a lognormal distribution of diameters. Both modeling schemes produced an efficiency curve that simulated efficiency measurements made over a range of particle diameters (0.01 - 0.3 µm) with the use of a scanning mobility particle sizer in the region where efficiency is at a minimum. However, the method using a distribution of fiber diameters produced a better fit for particles > 0.1 µm. The coefficients associated with a simple form of the diffusion equation constituting a power law incorporating the Peclet number were adjusted to enhance model accuracy. Likewise, the fiber charge of the electret fibers was also adjusted to maximize model fit but remained within levels reported by others. A filter pressure drop model was also developed. Results demonstrated the need for a pressure drop model applicable to N95s relative to existing models developed with the use of fibers with larger diameters than those used in current N95 FFRs. A set of N95 FFR characteristics are provided that can be used to develop models of typical N95 FFR filter performance and pressure drop in future studies.

Hazardous metals in vintage plastic toys measured by a handheld X-ray fluorescence spectrometer.

Over 100 plastic toys from the 1970s and 1980s, both polyvinyl chloride ("vinyl") and nonvinyl, were analyzed in the study described here using a handheld X-ray fluorescence spectrometer to quantify hazardous metal content. A sampling of recent vinyl toys was also tested. The majority of nonvinyl samples were Fisher Price brand toys. The vinyl toys consisted largely of Barbie dolls and other dolls. Overall, lead or cadmium was found in 67% of vintage plastic toys, frequently at concentrations exceeding current U.S. and European limits. Arsenic was detected at levels of concern in 16% of the samples. In the nonvinyl toys, heavy metal content was found to correlate with certain colors of plastic. The likely sources of the detected metals are discussed. None of the contemporary vinyl toys contained detectable cadmium, lead, or arsenic. Given that vintage toys remain in widespread use by children in homes and other locations, the results illuminate a potential source of heavy metal exposure for children.

Efficient allocation of resources to prevent HIV infection among injection drug users: the Prevention Point Philadelphia (PPP) needle exchange program.

The objective of this study is to determine the allocation of resources within a multi-site needle exchange program (NEP) that achieves the largest possible reduction in new HIV infections at minimum cost. We present a model that relates the number of injection drug user (IDU) clients and the number of syringes exchanged per client to both the costs of the NEP and the expected reduction in HIV infections per unit time. We show that cost-effective allocation within a multi-site NEP requires that sites be located where the density of IDUs is highest, and that the number of syringes exchanged per client be equal across sites. We apply these optimal allocation rules to a specific multi-site needle exchange program, Prevention Point Philadelphia (PPP). This NEP, we find, needs to add 2 or 3 new sites in neighborhoods with the highest density of IDU AIDS cases, and to increase its total IDU client base by about 28%, from approximately 6400 to 8200 IDU clients. The case-study NEP also needs to increase its hours of operation at two existing sites, where the number of needles distributed per client is currently sub-optimal, by 50%. At the optimal allocation, the estimated cost per case of HIV averted would be dollar 2800 (range dollar 2300-dollar 4200). Such a favorable cost-effectiveness ratio derives primarily from PPP's low marginal costs per distributed needle.