Is closing the gap working?

Indigenous welfare, health not improving - study

FLINDERS UNIVERSITY

Research News

 

Gaping policy shortfalls in the Australian Government's 'Closing the Gap' program have seen it fail to reduce disparities in Indigenous health, income, employment, child removal and incarceration, Flinders University researchers say.

Their five-year study just published in the Australian Journal of Public Administration examined why the targets of Australia's national Closing the Gap strategy to reduce or eliminate inequalities in health, education and employment outcomes between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and other Australians have mostly not been met.

"Despite talk of governments 'doing things with and not to' Indigenous Australians, we found that most strategies implemented under Closing the Gap are controlled from the top by government agencies, leaving little room for Indigenous communities to have a say," says lead author Dr Matthew Fisher, a senior researcher at the Southgate Institute for Health, Society and Equity at Flinders University.

"Indigenous leaders said consistently that Closing the Gap policy will be more successful when it supports greater community control at a local level and puts more focus on strategies to build community resources for health and wellbeing," said Dr Fisher.

The study interviewed more than 40 key individuals involved in Closing the Gap policy between 2008 and 2018, from within and outside government. More than half of the interviewees identified as Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander.

"The Indigenous health program within the national Department of Health provides a model of good practice," said Dr Fisher. "It adopts a partnership approach to policy governance and supports a network of over 140 Aboriginal community-controlled health services."

"However, 'Closing the Gap' strategies in education and employment could learn from this good practice," he says, adding that Closing the Gap adopted a new partnership approach in 2019 aimed at improving outcomes.

'Closing the Gap' is a national strategy aiming to reduce or eliminate inequalities in health, education and employment outcomes between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and other Australians.

"Strong cultures are central to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health and wellbeing, and this needs to be reflected in Closing the Gap strategies," says co-author and Waljen woman, Associate Professor Tamara Mackean, from Flinders University.

"In the 10 years studied, we identified policy incoherence between Closing the Gap policies, aiming to improve Indigenous health, and other policies in income management, child removal and incarceration, which are having the opposite effect," she says.

"Our research suggests that beliefs held by some political leaders about the superiority of 'Western' cultures over Indigenous cultures are a barrier to the policy changes needed to really close the gap in Australia," the research concludes.

"The new policies adopted in 2019 are a very positive development, but in order to succeed the Closing the Gap program should address the issues identified in this research," researchers say.

###

Read the article, Stakeholder perceptions of policy implementation for Indigenous health and cultural safety: A study of Australia's 'Closing the Gap' policies (2021) by M Fisher, T Mackean, E George, S Friel and F Baum has been published in the Australian Journal of Public Administration (Wiley) DOI: 10.1111/1467-8500.12482.

Acknowledgements - The study received funding from the NHMRC Centre of Research Excellence on the Social Determinants of Health Equity, Grant/Award Number: GNT1078046

No link between milk and increased cholesterol according to new study of 2 million people

UNIVERSITY OF READING

Research News

 

Regular consumption of milk is not associated with increased levels of cholesterol, according to new research.

A study published in the International Journal of Obesity looked at three large population studies and found that people who regularly drank high amounts of milk had lower levels of both good and bad cholesterol, although their BMI levels were higher than non-milk drinkers. Further analysis of other large studies also suggests that those who regularly consumed milk had a 14% lower risk of coronary heart disease.

The team of researchers took a genetic approach to milk consumption by looking at a variation in the lactase gene associated with digestion of milk sugars known as lactose.

The study identified that having the genetic variation where people can digest lactose was a good way for identifying people who consumed higher levels of milk.

Prof Vimal Karani, Professor of Nutrigenetics and Nutrigenomics at the University of Reading said:

"We found that among participants with a genetic variation that we associated with higher milk intake, they had higher BMI, body fat, but importantly had lower levels of good and bad cholesterol. We also found that those with the genetic variation had a significantly lower risk of coronary heart disease. All of this suggests that reducing the intake of milk might not be necessary for preventing cardiovascular diseases."

The new research was conducted following several contradictory studies that have previously investigated the causal link between higher dairy intake and cardiometabolic diseases such as obesity and diabetes. To account for inconsistencies in sampling size, ethnicity and other factors, the team conducted a meta-analysis of data in up to 1.9 million people and used the genetic approach to avoid confounding.

Even though the UK biobank data showed that those with the lactase genetic variation had 11% lower risk of type 2 diabetes, the study did not suggest that there is any strong evidence for a link between higher milk intake and increased likelihood of diabetes or its related traits such as glucose and inflammatory biomarkers.

Professor Karani said:

"The study certainly shows that milk consumption is not a significant issue for cardiovascular disease risk even though there was a small rise in BMI and body fat among milk drinkers. What we do note in the study is that it remains unclear whether it is the fat content in dairy products that is contributing to the lower cholesterol levels or it is due to an unknown 'milk factor'".

###

The team from the University of Reading, University of South Australia, Southern Australian Health and Medical Research Institute, University College London, and University of Auckland worked together on the study.

Peer Reviewed
Meta Analysis
Humans

New research suggests that night shift work is linked to menstrual irregularity and increased risk of developing endometriosis

EUROPEAN SOCIETY OF ENDOCRINOLOGY

Research News

 

Press release - Abstract 1394: Alterations in clock genes expression in Eutopic and Ectopic Endometrial Tissue

New research suggests that night shift work is linked to menstrual irregularity and increased chance of developing endometriosis

According to a study being presented at the 23rd European Congress of Endocrinology (e-ECE 2021), on Sunday 23 May at 19:00 CET (http://www.ece2021.org), women working night shifts may be at a greater risk of menstrual irregularity and developing endometriosis. The research found a reduction in the expression of PER-2, CRY-1 and CLOCK genes along with an increase in REV-ERBb in ectopic compared to eutopic tissues. Prior to this research, there had been no previously published studies relating to the alterations in core clock-genes and the impact on women with endometriosis.

Endometriosis is a condition where tissue similar to the lining of the womb starts to grow in other places such as ovaries and fallopian tubes. Endometriosis affects roughly 10% (190 million) of reproductive age women and girls globally. The symptoms of endometriosis can vary - some women are badly affected, while others might not have any noticeable symptoms. In severe cases, it can be very painful and can cause infertility, miscarriages and ectopic pregnancies due to the probable effects of endometriosis on the pelvic cavity, ovaries, fallopian tubes, or uterus.2 Disruption of circadian rhythm in night shift workers has been associated with menstrual irregularity, as well as an increased chance of developing endometriosis and ovarian tumours.

Dr. Narjes Nasiri-Ansari, Dr. Aggeliki Karapanagioti, and a team of colleagues under the guidance and supervision of Professor Eva Kassi from the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Greece, investigated the expression of the core clock related genes in paired eutopic and ectopic endometrial tissues. The study looked at 27 patients with confirmed ovarian endometriosis. Eleven (11) paired samples were collected from ovarian cysts (ectopic endometrial tissues) and normal endometrium (eutopic tissues), while further eight (8) ectopic and eight (8) eutopic endometrial tissues were collected from 16 different patients with the same diagnosis.

"The clinical evidence that circadian rhythm disruptions can be associated with endometriosis, is now confirmed at tissue level, by the altered expression of local clock genes in ectopic endometrium. Understanding the causes and effects of endometriosis will improve our ability to detect, manage or even prevent the condition. These findings provide us with a better understanding of biological rhythm disturbances," commented Professor Eva Kassi.

The results from this study demonstrate an altered expression of CLOCK, CRY1, PER-2 and Rev-ERBb in normal endometrium tissues, as compared to ectopic endometrial tissues, indicating a disturbance of biological timing. However, the causal relationship of the altered expression pattern of these genes with the development of endometriosis needs further investigation.

IBS patients' symptoms improved under COVID-19 lockdown orders

Unexpected reduction in symptoms may result from lower stress and more control over diet at home

DIGESTIVE DISEASE WEEK

Research News

 

Bethesda, MD (May 23, 2021) -- Patients' irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) symptoms unexpectedly improved when they were under COVID-19 stay-at-home orders, reaffirming the gut-brain connection in functional gastrointestinal disorders, according to research that was selected for presentation at Digestive Disease Week® (DDW) 2021.

"One of our main hypotheses was that these patients were going to be worse because of pressure and stress due to COVID-19," said Juan Pablo Stefanolo, MD, a lead author on the study and a physician with the Neurogastroenterology and Motility section, Hospital de Clínicas José de San Martín, Buenos Aires University, Argentina. "We think the results have something to do with people staying at home. They were not exposed to outside stress, and at home they were able to avoid food triggers."

Pandemic lockdown orders in Argentina created a unique opportunity for researchers to study the impact of pandemic stressors and reduced social interaction on 129 IBS patients whose pre-pandemic data had already been collected through an earlier research project. The patients were re-assessed during the lockdown with the same online survey that included multiple validated measures of IBS severity, anxiety and depression, along with questions about co-occurring illnesses, including heartburn, regurgitation, indigestion, chronic fatigue, fibromyalgia and nonmigraine headaches.

During the lockdown in Argentina -- one of the longest lockdowns in the world -- the number of patients experiencing severe IBS fell sharply from 65 to 39. The mean Irritable Bowel Syndrome Severity Scale score for the group also fell 66 points, from 278 to 212 on a 500-point scale. IBS symptoms of pain, distention, stool consistency, anxiety, somatization, fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue symptoms all improved during the lockdown.

Patients with functional gastrointestinal disorders experience symptoms even though no structural or biochemical abnormalities are present. The gut-brain connection refers to the role of stress and psychological difficulties in triggering debilitating gut-related symptoms. Headache, heartburn and regurgitation -- all outside the category of functional disorders -- became worse during the study, likely due to the increase in weight that nearly 60 percent of patients reported.

"Our results reinforce the concept that IBS, or functional gastrointestinal disorders, have a connection to psychosocial factors, as well as food and other factors," Dr. Stefanolo said. "The gut-brain axis has a lot of facets."

###

DDW Presentation Details

Dr. Stefanolo will present data from the study, "Gut-brain axis and irritable bowel syndrome during SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. A survey-based study," abstract Su093, on Sunday, May 23, at 1 p.m. EDT.

For more information about featured studies, as well as a schedule of availability for featured researchers, please visit http://www.ddw.org/press.

Digestive Disease Week® (DDW) is the largest international gathering of physicians, researchers and academics in the fields of gastroenterology, hepatology, endoscopy and gastrointestinal surgery. Jointly sponsored by the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases (AASLD), the American Gastroenterological Association (AGA) Institute, the American Society for Gastrointestinal Endoscopy (ASGE) and the Society for Surgery of the Alimentary Tract (SSAT), DDW is a fully virtual meeting from May 21-23, 2021. The meeting showcases more than 2,000 abstracts and hundreds of lectures on the latest advances in GI research, medicine and technology. More information can be found at http://www.ddw.org.

 

Smart toilet may soon analyze stool for health problems

Artificial intelligence tool can be used for long-term tracking and management of chronic gastrointestinal ailments

DIGESTIVE DISEASE WEEK

Research News

 

Bethesda, MD (May 22, 2021) -- An artificial intelligence tool under development at Duke University can be added to the standard toilet to help analyze patients' stool and give gastroenterologists the information they need to provide appropriate treatment, according to research that was selected for presentation at Digestive Disease Week® (DDW) 2021. The new technology could assist in managing chronic gastrointestinal issues such as inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) and irritable bowel syndrome (IBS).

"Typically, gastroenterologists have to rely on patient self-reported information about their stool to help determine the cause of their gastrointestinal health issues, which can be very unreliable," said Deborah Fisher, MD, one of the lead authors on the study and associate professor of medicine at Duke University Durham, North Carolina. "Patients often can't remember what their stool looks like or how often they have a bowel movement, which is part of the standard monitoring process. The Smart Toilet technology will allow us to gather the long-term information needed to make a more accurate and timely diagnosis of chronic gastrointestinal problems."

The technology can be retrofitted within the pipes of an existing toilet. Once a person has a bowel movement and flushes, the toilet will take an image of the stool within the pipes. The data collected over time will provide a gastroenterologist a better understanding of a patient's stool form (i.e., loose, normal or constipated) and the presence of blood, allowing them to diagnose the patient and provide the right treatment for their condition.

To develop the artificial intelligence image analysis tool for the Smart Toilet, researchers analyzed 3,328 unique stool images found online or provided by research participants. All images were reviewed and annotated by gastroenterologists according to the Bristol Stool Scale, a common clinical tool for classifying stool. Using a computationally efficient approach to convolutional neural networks, which is a type of deep learning algorithm that can analyze images, researchers found that the algorithm accurately classified the stool form 85.1 percent of the time; gross blood detection had an accuracy of 76.3 percent.

"We are optimistic about patient willingness to use this technology because it's something that can be installed in their toilet's pipes and doesn't require the patient to do anything other than flush," said Sonia Grego, PhD, a lead researcher on the study and founding director of the Duke Smart Toilet Lab. "An IBD flare-up could be diagnosed using the Smart Toilet and the patient's response to treatment could be monitored with the technology. This could be especially useful for patients who live in long-term care facilities who may not be able to report their conditions and could help improve initial diagnosis of acute conditions."

The prototype has promising feasibility, but it is not yet available to the public. Researchers are developing additional features of the technology to include stool specimen sampling for biochemical marker analysis that will provide highly specific disease data to meet patients' and gastroenterologists' needs.

###

DDW Presentation Details

Dr. Fisher will present data from the study, "Automated stool image analysis by artificial intelligence in a smart toilet," abstract Sa652, on Saturday, May 22, at 12:15 p.m. EDT. For more information about featured studies, as well as a schedule of availability for featured researchers, please visit http://www.ddw.org/press.

Digestive Disease Week® (DDW) is the largest international gathering of physicians, researchers and academics in the fields of gastroenterology, hepatology, endoscopy and gastrointestinal surgery. Jointly sponsored by the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases (AASLD), the American Gastroenterological Association (AGA) Institute, the American Society for Gastrointestinal Endoscopy (ASGE) and the Society for Surgery of the Alimentary Tract (SSAT), DDW is a fully virtual meeting from May 21-23, 2021. The meeting showcases more than 2,000 abstracts and hundreds of lectures on the latest advances in GI research, medicine and technology. More information can be found at http://www.ddw.org.

 

New COVID-19 rapid test kit receives scientific seal of approval

The researchers suggest the test could be deployed in remote locations, clinics and airports due to its ease of use and portability

SIMON FRASER UNIVERSITY

Research News

 

Simon Fraser University researchers have validated a faster, cheaper COVID-19 test that could kickstart the expansion of more widespread rapid testing. Study results have been published in The Journal of Molecular Diagnostics.

"This research offers a cheaper, faster alternative to the most reliable and sensitive test currently used worldwide, without sacrificing sensitivity and reproducibility," says molecular biology and biochemistry professor Peter Unrau, who led the team evaluating the COVID-19 test kit.

The researchers suggest the test could be deployed in remote locations, clinics and airports due to its ease of use and portability.

The microchip real-time PCR test can provide accurate results in 30 minutes and requires 10 times less reagents than the tube-based RT-PCR tests approved by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Supply chain shortages of reagents and test kits during the pandemic has slowed the rapid expansion of clinical testing. This new COVID-19 test kit is another tool in the toolbox that uses less of the supply constrained reagents to achieve fast and accurate results.

Unrau, along with PhD candidate Razvan Cojocaru and Master's student Iqra Yaseen, first evaluated test sensitivity in the lab.

Then the test kit was sent to a clinical team at St. Paul's Hospital in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada to determine its ability to detect COVID-19 in patient samples. The microchip PCR COVID-19 test kit results aligned with hospital testing results - demonstrating its effectiveness.

The kit comes preloaded with COVID-19 primers and probes making it easy to use, reducing the potential for user error and improving the reliability of test results.

The COVID-19 detection kits developed by Lumex Instruments Canada and validated by Unrau's team are low power (100 watt), compact, lightweight and available internationally.

###

 

Evacuating under dire wildfire scenarios

UNIVERSITY OF UTAH

Research News

 

IMAGE: IN 2018, THE CAMP FIRE RIPPED THROUGH THE TOWN OF PARADISE, CALIFORNIA AT AN UNPRECEDENTED RATE. MUCH OF THE TOWN WAS DESTROYED IN THE TRAGEDY. view more 

CREDIT: THE WHITE HOUSE VIA WIKICOMMONS

In 2018, the Camp Fire ripped through the town of Paradise, California at an unprecedented rate. Officials had prepared an evacuation plan that required 3 hours to get residents to safety. The fire, bigger and faster than ever before, spread to the community in only 90 minutes.

As climate change intensifies, wildfires in the West are behaving in ways that were unimaginable in the past--and the common disaster response approaches are woefully unprepared for this new reality. In a recent study, a team of researchers led by the University of Utah proposed a framework for simulating dire scenarios, which the authors define as scenarios where there is less time to evacuate an area than is required. The paper, published on April 21, 2021 in the journal Natural Hazards Review, found that minimizing losses during dire scenarios involves elements that are not represented in current simulation models, among them improvisation and altruism.

"The world is dealing with situations that exceed our worst case scenarios," said lead author Thomas Cova, professor of geography at the U. "Basically we're calling for planning for the unprecedented, which is a tough thing to do."

Most emergency officials in fire-prone regions develop evacuation plans based on the assumptions that wildfires and residents will behave predictably based on past events. However, recent devastating wildfires in Oregon, California and other western states have shown that those assumptions may no longer hold.

"Wildfires are really becoming more unpredictable due to climate change. And from a psychological perspective, we have people in the same area being evacuated multiple times in the past 10 years. So, when evacuation orders come, people think, 'Well, nothing happened the last few times. I'm staying,'" said Frank Drews, professor of psychology at the U and co-author of the study. "Given the reality of climate change, it's important to critically assess where we are and say, 'Maybe we can't count on certain assumptions like we did in the past.'"

How to predict the unprecedented

The framework allows planners to create a dire wildfire scenario--when the lead time, defined as the time before the fire reaches a community to respond, is less than the time required to evacuate. The authors developed a scoring system that categorizes each scenario as routine, dire, very dire or extremely dire based on many different factors.

One big factor affecting the direness is the ignition location, as one closer to a community offers less time than one farther away. A second major factor is the wildfire detection time. During the day, plumes of smoke can cue a quick response, but if it starts at night when everyone is asleep, it could take longer to get people moving. Officials may delay their decisions to avoid disrupting the community unnecessarily, but a last-minute evacuation order can cause traffic jams or put a strain on low-mobility households.

Alert system technologies can create dire circumstances if residents do not receive the warning in time due to poor cellphone coverage or low subscription rates to reverse 911 warning systems. If the community has many near misses with wildfire, the public's response could be to enact a wait-and-see approach before they leave their homes.

Using a dire scenario dashboard, the user assigns various factors an impediment level--low, minor or major--that can change at any point to lessen or increase a situation's direness.

"Usually when we run computer simulations, nothing ever goes wrong. But in the real world, things can get much worse half-way through an evacuation," said Cova. "So, what happens when you don't have enough time? The objective switches from getting everyone out to instead minimizing casualties. It's dark."

"More people began working remotely from home during the pandemic, which then led to them moving out of large cities into rural areas," explained assistant professor Dapeng Li of the South Dakota State University Department of Geography and Geospatial Sciences, a co-author and U alumnus who helped develop the computer simulations. "These rural communities typically have fewer resources and face challenges in rapidly evacuating a larger number of residents in this type of emergency situation."

Reducing dire scenarios

Simulating dire wildfire scenarios can improve planning and the outcomes in cases where everything goes wrong. For example, creating fire shelters and safety zones inside of a community can protect residents who can't get out, while reducing traffic congestion for others who can evacuate. During the 2018 Camp Fire, people improvised temporary refuges in parking lots and community buildings. Modeling could help city planners construct permanent safety areas ahead of time.

A common human response during wildfires are improvisations and creative thinking, which are difficult to model but can be literally lifesaving. For example, during the 2020 Creek Fire in California, a nearby military base sent a helicopter to rescue trapped campers. Another crucial component is individuals helping others, such as people giving others rides or warning neighbors who missed the official alert. During the Camp Fire, Joe Kennedy used his bulldozer to singlehandedly clear abandoned cars that were blocking traffic.

"It is very common for families and neighbors to assume a first responder role and help each other during disasters," said Laura Siebeneck, associate professor of emergency management and disaster science at the University of North Texas and co-author of the study. "Many times, individuals and groups come together, cooperate, and improvise solutions as needed. Though it is difficult to capture improvisation and altruism in the modeling environment, better understanding human behavior during dire events can potentially lead to better protective actions and preparedness to dire wildfire events."

Studying and modeling dire scenarios is necessary to improve the outcomes of unprecedented changes in fire occurrence and behavior. This study is the first attempt to develop a simulation framework for these scenarios, and more research is needed to incorporate the unpredictable elements that create increasingly catastrophic wildfires.

###

UBCO researchers examine how pandemics impact the homeless

Forgotten population becomes more so during time of crises and disease

UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA OKANAGAN CAMPUS

Research News

 

A team of UBC Okanagan researchers is looking at strategies that could help the homeless during a pandemic.

John Graham, director of UBC Okanagan's School of Social Work, says while many populations have been targeted with guidelines to keep them safe, homeless people have been mostly overlooked.

While this research project began a few years ago, Graham says his team quickly turned their attention to the impact of COVID-19. His team looked at peer-reviewed publications, dating back to 1984, that examined how homeless populations were impacted by other highly contagious or communicable illnesses such as tuberculous, H1NI and Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS).

"Those experiencing homelessness do not fare well in terms of general health and this risk rises during public health outbreaks," says Graham. "Research findings have shown that homeless people under the age of 65 have a mortality rate five to 10 times higher compared to the general population."

Before this research, Graham, who is principal investigator of the Kelowna Homelessness Research Initiative, says no one really knew how pandemics historically impacted services for the homeless sector.

"It's important to remember that when public health officials make recommendations and response to a community they don't necessarily take into account all populations," he says. "Some of the methods of response are not easily transferable to the homeless populations -- that's partially because of their transient nature. But it is not unusual for homeless individuals to have a number of underlying illnesses, which could leave them more susceptible to virus obtainment, transmission and mortality."

Postdoctoral researcher Jordan Babando says they looked at a range of journal articles from across the world and identified six key themes that particularly affect the homeless: education and outreach, structure of services provided, screening and contact tracing, transmission and prevention strategies, shelter protocols and finally treatment, adherence and vaccination.

"Those experiencing homelessness often live in low?capacity shelters or transient locations that likely have no access to hygienic resources. This places them at increased risk of obtaining and spreading viruses in comparison to the general population," says Babando.

Shelter overcrowding, poor ventilation and an accumulation of clients with predispositions to infection increase the risk factors for virus and also complicate detection and tracing procedure, he explains.

"These concerns provide extraordinary considerations for developing and implementing pandemic and outbreak response planning and protocols," says Babando. "Trying to get the homeless population to come into the clinic for a vaccine and adhere to stay at home or social distancing regulations is difficult."

The goal of this research paper, says Graham, is to help public health agencies and homelessness sectors formulate a pandemic response to homeless populations.

"We need to move the needle as quickly as possible when it comes to our homeless situation," he says. "COVID-19 is extraordinarily significant for all of us, but most especially our vulnerable people. We hope these findings will contribute further to the dialogue help to end homelessness."

###

The paper, published recently in Health and Social Care, was funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council.

 

Preventing the spread of plant pandemics

New tools needed to curb threats to global food security

MCGILL UNIVERSITY

Research News

  

Plant diseases don't stop at national borders and miles of oceans don't prevent their spread, either. That's why plant disease surveillance, improved detection systems, and global predictive disease modeling are necessary to mitigate future disease outbreaks and protect the global food supply, according to a team of researchers in a new commentary published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The idea is to "detect these plant disease outbreak sources early and stop the spread before it becomes a pandemic," says lead-author Jean Ristaino, William Neal Reynolds Distinguished Professor of Plant Pathology at North Carolina State University. Once an epidemic occurs it is difficult to control, Ristaino says, likening the effort to the one undertaken to stop the spread of COVID-19.

"We've seen how important information sharing, data analytics, and modelling have been in responding to the COVID-19 pandemic. These types of tools could also be leveraged to help build resilience to future plant disease outbreaks - from identifying risk in global crop trade networks to local citizen science monitoring," says co-author Graham MacDonald, Assistant Professor in the Department of Geography at McGill University.

While some diseases are already under some sort of global surveillance - such as wheat rust and late blight, an important pathogen that affects potatoes and caused the Irish famine - other crop diseases are not routinely monitored.

"There are a few existing surveillance networks, but they need to be connected and funded by intergovernmental agencies and expanded to global surveillance systems," says Ristaino. "We can improve disease monitoring using electronic sensors that can help rapidly detect and then track emerging plant pathogens."

Working together to protect crops

The researchers say the efforts from a wide range of scholars - so-called convergence science - are needed to prevent plant disease pandemics. That means economists, engineers, crop scientists, crop disease specialists, geneticists, geographers, data analysts, statisticians and others working together to protect crops, the farmers growing crops and the people fed by those crops.

Research is underway to model the risk of plant pathogen spread and help predict and then prevent outbreaks, they report in the paper. Modeling and forecasting disease spread can help mobilize mitigation strategies more precisely to stop pandemics.

Plant disease outbreaks are increasing

Global plant disease outbreaks are increasing in frequency and threaten the global food supply, the researchers say. Mean losses to major food crops such as wheat, rice and maize ranged from 21 percent to 30 percent due to plant pests and diseases, according to a paper published in 2019.

Take the case of bananas, specifically the Cavendish variety, which has no resistance to a specific pathogen called Fusarium odoratissimum Tropical race 4, which causes Panama disease. That pathogen spread rapidly from Asia to Africa, the Middle East and recently into South America, where it affects the main type of banana grown in the Americas for export.

Climate change exacerbating outbreaks

Climate change will likely exacerbate these outbreaks, the researchers say. In Africa, for example, climate change and drought in Saharan Africa affects the population and range of locusts, which devastate crops further south in sub-Saharan Africa. Climate data can help drive disease forecasting and spread models.

"More frequent rainfall can allow airborne plant pathogens to spread and fungal spores can move with hurricanes, which is how soybean rust came to North America from South America - via storms," says Ristaino, who also directs North Carolina State's faculty cluster on emerging plant disease and global food security. "There are also cases of early emergence, when pathogens emerge earlier in the growing season than usual due to warmer springs."

Further, the global nature of food trade is driving some plant disease pandemics. The emergence of new harmful plant pathogens adds other risks to the food supply, which is already strained by growing global demand for food.

"Globalization means that agriculture and food supplies are increasingly interconnected across national borders. Analyzing these crop trade networks combined with greater information sharing among countries can help to pinpoint risks from pests or diseases," says MacDonald.

The researchers say there is a need to link human global health and plant global health scientists to work together. Food security and livelihoods are linked to agriculture and human health is linked to the food we consume.

###

About the study

"The persistent threat of emerging plant disease pandemics to global food security" by Jean B. Ristaino, Pamela Anderson, Dan Bebber, Kate A. Brauman, Nik J. Cunniffe, Nina Fedoroff, Cambria Finegold, Karen A. Garrett, Christopher A. Gilligan, Christopher Jones, Michael Martin, Graham K. MacDonald, Patricia Neenan, Angela Records, David Schmale, Laura Tateosian, and Qingshan Wei is published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

DOI: https://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2022239118

About McGill University

Founded in 1821, McGill University is home to exceptional students, faculty, and staff from across Canada and around the world. It is consistently ranked as one of the top universities, both nationally and internationally. It is a world-renowned institution of higher learning with research activities spanning two campuses, 11 faculties, 13 professional schools, 300 programs of study and over 40,000 students, including more than 10,200 graduate students.??

McGill's commitment to sustainability reaches back several decades and spans scales from local to global. The sustainability declarations that we have signed affirm our role in helping to shape a future where people and the planet can flourish.

https://www.mcgill.ca/newsroom/

Business shutdowns reduce COVID-19 deaths

PLOS

Research News

 

Business shutdowns reduce COVID-19 deaths, though with rapidly diminishing returns, with study of Italian lockdowns estimating they saved over 9,400 lives in under a month.

Article Title: Closed for business: The mortality impact of business closures during the Covid-19 pandemic

Funding: The author(s) received no specific funding for this work.

Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Article URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0251373