Protecting species for the good of global climate

How climate can benefit from the conservation of biodiversity

Peer-Reviewed Publication

HELMHOLTZ CENTRE FOR ENVIRONMENTAL RESEARCH - UFZ

 

IMAGE: THE WORLD HERITAGE SITE WITH ITS IRRIGATED FIELDS OWES ITS EXISTENCE TO A CONTINUOUS WATER SUPPLY FROM THE FORESTS ABOVE. WHILE METHANE IS EMITTED THROUGH RICE CULTIVATION, THE TRADITIONAL GENETIC DIVERSITY OF RICE PLANTS IS PRESERVED HERE AT THE SAME TIME, WHICH CAN FORM THE BASIS FOR FUTURE LAND USE ADAPTATIONS. IT ALSO PRESERVES THE FOREST, WHICH IS CHARACTERISED BY ENORMOUS BIODIVERSITY AND A HIGH PROPORTION OF ANIMAL AND PLANT SPECIES FOUND ONLY THERE. AT THE SAME TIME, THIS PROTECTION CONTRIBUTES TO THE SEQUESTRATION OF CARBON IN THE FORESTS. view more 

CREDIT: ©ANDRÉ KÜNZELMANN / UFZ

When the global community is expected to meet for the second part of the UN Biodiversity Conference in Kunming, China, in autumn, it must also adopt the next generation of UN biodiversity targets. These will then replace the Aichi Targets that were aimed for until 2020 – and have hardly been achieved. 21 "Post-2020 Action Targets for 2030” have already been pre-formulated. While they still have to be finally agreed, they aim to reduce potential threats to biodiversity, improve the well-being of humans, and implement tools and solutions for the conservation of biodiversity.

In a review study for Global Change Biology, the authors assessed to which extent these 21 biodiversity targets can also slow climate change. The bottom line: 14 out of 21 (i.e. two thirds) of all targets are making a positive contribution to climate protection. “It turns out that conservation measures that halt, slow, or reverse the loss of biodiversity can greatly slow human-induced climate change at the same time”, says lead author Dr. Yunne-Jai Shin of the French National Research Institute for Sustainable Development (IRD). Among others, this applies to the goal of connecting protected areas via corridors or further protected areas on at least 30% of the earth’s surface. “There is growing evidence that the creation of new protected areas and the adequate management of existing ones on land and in the sea help to mitigate climate change through capture and storage of carbon”, says UFZ biodiversity researcher and co-author Prof. Josef Settele. For example, it is estimated that all terrestrial protected areas around the globe currently store 12–16% of the total global carbon stock. And, even though knowledge is still limited, deep-sea ecosystems can also contain important carbon stocks on the seabed (e.g. on remote islands, deep-sea mountains, and Arctic and Antarctic continental shelves). However, the 30% target is still far from being reached. According to current United Nations figures from 2021, the coverage of protected areas on land was 15.7%, and in the sea, 7.7%.

But climate also benefits from some of the other newly formulated global biodiversity goals. For example, one goal is also to restore at least 20% of degraded ecosystems (e.g. tropical and subtropical forests) or coastal habitats (e.g. coral reefs, sea grass beds, and mangrove forests). According to the study, global carbon capture in coastal systems is considerably lower than in terrestrial forests because of their smaller size. However, the amount of carbon captured per unit of coastal vegetation area is considerably higher. Taking biodiversity into account in laws, directives, and spatial planning processes also helps to protect the climate because, inter alia, it prevents the clearing of forests, which are an important CO2 reservoir. Other goals that are positive for both biodiversity and climate protection include the expansion of green and blue infrastructures in cities (e.g. parks, green roofs, and lakes) or better public relations work in order to encourage the general public to deal with waste in a more sustainable way and to consume less.

The authors have compiled 12 case studies in order to illustrate how these biodiversity goals are already being implemented in practice (e.g. in the conservation of African peat lands, the protection of mega-fauna in the Southern Ocean, or the saving of the largest mangrove forests on earth, the Sundarbans, on the border between India and Bangladesh). However, there may also be conflicting goals between the protection of climate and biodiversity. In Central Europe, the preservation of the cultural landscape is an example that shows that not everything can be easily reconciled. On one hand, imitating traditional land use systems instead of intensifying or even abandoning land use has clear advantages for the conservation of biodiversity. “These systems reduce the extinction risk of rare species and varieties that are quite well adapted to an extensive form of agricultural use and promote the preservation of a high diversity of pollinators and natural enemies of pests”, says UFZ researcher Josef Settele. On the other hand, there are conflicts because some of the measures are, in fact, harmful to climate. “Because much of the land is used for agriculture, the proportion of forest is not as high, and less carbon is stored”, he says. In addition, the farming of cattle, sheep, and cows releases methane, which is harmful to the climate. “There is a consensus that we must stop climate change – but this must not be at the expense of nature. We therefore need to find methods to slow climate change and implement adaptation measures without losing biodiversity. This is often possible only through compromises”, says Settele. It would therefore be positive if many of the new global biodiversity targets of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity were implemented. Prof. Hans-Otto Pörtner, co-author and climate researcher at the Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research (AWI), adds: “The climate problem is now well understood. However, the issue of biodiversity is treated in complete separation – even when it comes to possible solutions. There is also the risk that nature is discussed as a vehicle for solving the climate problem; this is quite problematic. The capacity of ecosystems to slow climate change is overestimated, and climate change is damaging this capacity”. Humans nevertheless believe that nature is capable of overcoming the climate crisis and enabling us to continue or prolong the use of fossil fuels. “But it is the other way round: only when we succeed in drastically reducing emissions from fossil fuels nature can help us to stabilise the climate”, says Pörtner.

Last June, the scientists of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) set the record straight in a joint workshop report, where they compiled current knowledge on biodiversity and climate change, and defined and prioritised courses of action.

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JOURNAL

Global Change Biology

DOI

10.1111/gcb.16109 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Literature review

ARTICLE TITLE

Actions to halt biodiversity loss generally benefit the climate

Meet the forest microbes that can survive megafires

Burns allow fungi, bacteria to transform redwood forests

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA - RIVERSIDE

 

IMAGE: LYOPHYLLUM ATRATUM FORMS SMALL, DARK MUSHROOMS ON BURNT GROUND FOLLOWING FIRE. THIS SPECIES WAS FOUND IN SOIL BURNED BY THE SOBERANES FIRE. view more 

CREDIT: DYLAN ENRIGHT/UCR

New UC Riverside research shows fungi and bacteria able to survive redwood tanoak forest megafires are microbial “cousins” that often increase in abundance after feeling the flames. 

Fires of unprecedented size and intensity, called megafires, are becoming increasingly common. In the West, climate change is causing rising temperatures and earlier snow melt, extending the dry season when forests are most vulnerable to burning. 

Though some ecosystems are adapted for less intense fires, little is known about how plants or their associated soil microbiomes respond to megafires, particularly in California’s charismatic redwood tanoak forests. 

“It’s not likely plants can recover from megafires without beneficial fungi that supply roots with nutrients, or bacteria that transform extra carbon and nitrogen in post-fire soil,” said Sydney Glassman, UCR mycologist and lead study author. “Understanding the microbes is key to any restoration effort.”

The UCR team is contributing to this understanding with a paper in the journal Molecular Ecology. 

In addition to examining megafire effects on redwood tanoak forest microbes, the study is unusual for another reason. Soil samples were pulled from the same plots of land both before and immediately after the 2016 Soberanes fire in Monterey County. 

“To get this kind of data, a researcher would almost have to burn the plot themselves. It’s so tough to predict exactly where there will be a burn,” Glassman said. 

The team was not surprised to find that the Soberanes fire had a massive impact on bacterial and fungal communities, with as much as a 70% decline in the number of microbe species. They were surprised that some yeast and bacteria not only survived the fire but increased in abundance. 

Bacteria that increased included Actinobacteria, which are responsible for helping plant material decompose. The team also found an increase in Firmicutes, known for promoting plant growth, helping control plant pathogens, and remediating heavy metals in soil. 

In the fungal category, the team found a massive increase in heat resistant Basidioascus yeast, which is able to degrade different components in wood, including lignin, the tough part of plant cell walls that gives them structure and protects them from insect attacks.

Some of the microbes may have used novel strategies for increasing their numbers in the burn-scarred soils. “Penicillium is probably taking advantage of food released from necromass, or ‘dead bodies,’ and some species may also be able to eat charcoal,” Glassman said. 

Perhaps the team’s most significant finding is that fungi and bacteria — both those that survived the megafire and those that didn’t — appear to be genetically related to one another.

“They have shared adaptive traits that allow them to respond to fire, and this improves our ability to predict which microbes will respond, either positively or negatively, to events like these,” Glassman said. 

In general, little is known about fungi and the full extent of their effects on the environment. It is imperative that studies like these continue to reveal the ways they can help the environment recover from fires.

“One of the reasons there is so little understanding of fungi is that there are so few mycologists who study them,” Glassman said. “But they really do have important impacts, especially in the aftermath of major fires which are only increasing in frequency and severity both here and across the globe.”

  

CAPTION

The Soberanes Fire on a ridge near the Pacific Ocean in 2016.

CREDIT

CalFire

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JOURNAL

Molecular Ecology

DOI

10.1111/mec.16399 

ARTICLE TITLE

Mega-fire in redwood tanoak forest reduces bacterial and fungal richness and selects for pyrophilous taxa that are phylogenetically conserved

Study finds rate of multiple sclerosis similarly high in Black and white people

Prevalence of MS found to be lower in Hispanic and Asian people

Peer-Reviewed Publication

AMERICAN ACADEMY OF NEUROLOGY

MINNEAPOLIS – The rate of multiple sclerosis (MS) cases varies greatly by race and ethnicity. A new study suggests that the prevalence of MS in Black and white people is similarly high, while much lower in Hispanic and Asian people. The research is published in the April 27, 2022, online issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.

“MS has long been believed to be a disease of white people, but the prevalence of MS in Black people has been understudied and therefore underrecognized,” said study author Annette Langer-Gould, MD, PhD, of Kaiser Permanente Southern California in Los Angeles and a member of the American Academy of Neurology. “The findings of our study and other recent studies indicate that MS has affected Black and white adults at similar rates for decades.”

Langer-Gould said, “The belief that MS is rare in Black people has been based on a history of problematic evidence, including a 1950s study of veterans that found white men more likely than Black men to receive services through the Veterans Administration for MS. That study did not consider the barriers and disparities Black men faced in receiving services, and that they were less likely to be measured accurately.”

Langer-Gould also notes that even current research uses the terms Hispanic, Asian, Black, and white, which are socially constructed labels that influence social standing and opportunities for advancement in the U.S., not uniform biological or even cultural differences. She said it’s crucial that new research addresses systemic bias in medical research.

This new study looked at more than 2.6 million adults residing in Southern California. Researchers analyzed Kaiser Permanente health records to determine how many people had a confirmed diagnosis of MS in 2010.

Researchers identified 3,863 people with MS. The average age was 52 and 77% were women.

Researchers found that MS prevalence per 100,000 people was similarly high for Black and white people, occurring in 226 per 100,000 Black people and in 238 per 100,000 white people. MS prevalence was lower among Hispanic and Asian people, occurring in 70 per 100,000 Hispanic people and 23 per 100,000 Asian people.

The percentage of women with MS was more pronounced among Black and Asian people. Of Black people with MS, 82% were women and of Asian people, 84% were women. Of white people with MS, 76% were women and of Hispanic people, 75% were women.

“Understanding MS prevalence in all people has important implications when it comes to making sure people are properly screened and treated for this disease,” said Langer-Gould.

“More studies are needed to determine whether MS is also an emerging disease among Hispanic people in the U.S. and whether MS susceptibility and prevalence vary among Hispanic or Asian individuals from different cultures and ancestral backgrounds,” Langer-Gould added. “Larger studies are also needed that look at bigger populations across the U.S.”

The study was supported by the National Multiple Sclerosis Society.

Learn more about multiple sclerosis at BrainandLife.org, home of the American Academy of Neurology’s free patient and caregiver magazine focused on the intersection of neurologic disease and brain health. Follow Brain & Life® on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

When posting to social media channels about this research, we encourage you to use the hashtags #Neurology and #AANscience.

The American Academy of Neurology is the world’s largest association of neurologists and neuroscience professionals, with over 38,000 members. The AAN is dedicated to promoting the highest quality patient-centered neurologic care. A neurologist is a doctor with specialized training in diagnosing, treating and managing disorders of the brain and nervous system such as Alzheimer’s disease, stroke, migraine, multiple sclerosis, concussion, Parkinson’s disease and epilepsy.

For more information about the American Academy of Neurology, visit AAN.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn and YouTube.

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JOURNAL

Neurology

WASP KULTURE

School segregation: Contributor to racial/ethnic childhood obesity disparities

Peer-Reviewed Publication

THE OBESITY SOCIETY

SILVER SPRING, Md.---Obesity gaps are larger between segregated schools and smaller in racially-integrated schools among child populations, according to a new study in Obesity, The Obesity Society’s (TOS) flagship journal. This is the first study to examine childhood obesity disparities specifically within integrated schools to begin to elucidate the role of school segregation in the racial/ethnic patterning of obesity among youth.

“School-level racial segregation matters for child health disparities. Programs and policies to reduce gaps in obesity early in life must prioritize socioeconomically disadvantaged schools, and segregated schools attended primarily by children of color,“ said Brisa N. Sánchez, PhD, MS, MSc, Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Drexel University Dornsife School of Public Health, Philadelphia, Pa. Sánchez is the corresponding author of the study.

Recent studies have observed that racial or ethnic adult health disparities revealed in national data dissipate in racially integrated communities, supporting the theory that “place, not race” is a key driver of racial/ethnic health disparities. In other words, the characteristics of places and the systems or policies that influence place characteristics are more important than personal characteristics of individuals. This study tested this theory among children.

Publicly available overweight/obesity rates obtained from the California Department of Education (CDE) for fifth, seventh and ninth grade students attending state public schools in the 2018-2019 school year who participated in the California FitnessGram test were evaluated in this cross-sectional study for childhood obesity disparities. The FitnessGram is a physical fitness test required for all children in the aforementioned grades that is administered in the spring of the academic year.

The main outcome of interest is the body-composition assessment of the FitnessGram test. For this assessment, objectively measured height and weight are used to obtain children’s body mass index (BMI). BMI is then compared with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s age- and sex-specific BMI reference distributions to categorize children into three groups: healthy fitness zone, needs improvement and high risk, which correspond  to the BMI categories of normal weight, overweight and obese.

More than 1.3 million students were involved in the body composition assessment of the FitnessGram test of whom 54% were Latino, 23% were White, 9.5% were Asian, 5.4% were Black and 2.4% were Filipino. Data for the five major racial/ethnic groups included in the study was collected in more than 8,900 schools. Other races/ethnicities were excluded from the study due to small sample sizes within schools that led to masking of most of their data.

Results showed disparities within integrated schools and between segregated schools. The overweight/obesity gap between Latino, Black and Filipino children compared with White children was larger between segregated schools, relative to disparities within integrated schools:

• Whereas the disparity in overweight/obesity between Latino and White children was 22% when comparing Latino children in Latino-segregated schools to White children in White-segregated schools, the disparity narrowed to 11% when comparing rates between White and Latino children in integrated schools.
• The statewide disparity in overweight/obesity prevalence between Black and White children was 18% when comparing Black children in Black-segregated schools to White children in White-segregated schools, but narrowed to 6% within integrated schools.
• The disparity between Filipino and White children was 8% between segregated schools, but reversed to -1% within integrated schools.
• Overweight/obesity differences between Asian and White children were similar statewide and between segregated schools.

“Findings from this study suggest school segregation can foster the development of obesogenic conditions that disproportionately affect Latino, Black and Filipino childrens’ obesity risks.

While this study sheds light into the importance of school segregation, further research is needed to identify the mechanisms through which racial/ethnic integration and segregation in schools influence the current disparities in childhood obesity rates,” said Liliana Aguayo, PhD, MPH, an expert in childhood obesity disparities, TOS member and research assistant professor at Emory University's Hubert Department of Global Health in Atlanta, Ga. Aguayo was not associated with the research.

The study’s authors add that future research should examine the joint role of individual-level economic factors and racial/ethnic segregation to shed additional light on disparities and ways to reduce them. The researchers add that they were unable to conduct analyses that jointly examine economic and racial/ethnic disparities because the publicly available data from the CDE does not allow cross-classification of these factors within schools. Future research should also employ analytical approaches to disentangle the confounding effects of segregation and person-level race/ethnicity and produce valid estimates of individual-level disparities attributable to person-level factors, and, thus amenable to individual-level interventions, instead of disparities driven by segregation and concomitant place-based or structural interventions. Given findings from this and previous studies, estimating disparities within more granular levels of geography is critical to more accurately assess environmental determinants of disparities.

Other authors of the study include Nuha Mahmood of the University of Michigan Medical School, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor; Emma Sanchez-Vaznaugh, San Francisco University, San Francisco, Calif; and Mika Matsuzaki of Johns Hopkins University School of Public Health, John Hopkins University, Baltimore, Md.

The study, titled “Racial/Ethnic Disparities in Childhood Obesity: The Role of School Segregation,” will be published in the May 2022 print issue.

The authors declared no conflict of interest.

#  #  #

The Obesity Society (TOS) is the leading organization of scientists and health professionals devoted to understanding and reversing the epidemic of obesity and its adverse health, economic and societal effects. Combining the perspective of researchers, clinicians, policymakers and patients, TOS promotes innovative research, education and evidence-based clinical care to improve the health and well-being of all people with obesity. For more information, visit www.obesity.org.

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JOURNAL

Obesity

New approach to advance care planning preferred by Canadian long-term care residents

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF WATERLOO

Researchers have developed a better way to support end-of-life planning in long-term care homes, according to a recent study. 

The researchers also found that only 40 per cent of homes were routinely involving residents in end-of-life care discussions. 

“Often people assume that a non-capable resident can’t participate, but there are other ways of communicating and understanding an individual’s preferences,” said George Heckman, a researcher in Waterloo’s School of Public Health Sciences and Schlegel Research Chair with the Schlegel-UW Research Institute for Aging.  

The new approach to support end-of-life planning, Better tArgeting, Better outcomes for frail ELderly patients (BABEL), was found to be much more comprehensive than the usual manner in which long-term care homes conduct advance care planning.

The BABEL approach, developed by researchers at the Universities of Waterloo, Manitoba and Calgary, uses a tailored, person-centred approach based on best practices, and was designed with stakeholder input. BABEL was tested in 29 long-term care homes in three provinces: Ontario, Manitoba and Alberta. 

Advance care planning is a critical process that ensures individuals’ values, wishes and preferences are understood and honoured at the end of life. BABEL achieves that by involving residents as active participants and putting their values and wishes first. Since it is hard for individuals to think about hypotheticals, the care team focuses on situations most likely to happen to a resident and how outcomes of different treatments might align with their individual goals. 

“It’s a conversation that needs to happen often, as health status changes, and it involves residents, family members and the care team,” Heckman said. “As a physician, I know how important care at end of life is for individuals and their families, and this is an opportunity to get this right. BABEL certainly seems to help residents and substitute decision-makers with these otherwise challenging conversations and paves the way for more timely and comprehensive palliative care.”

Residents who participated in BABEL also avoided unhelpful and potentially harmful treatments at end of life. “Reducing the use of unnecessary treatments is often preferred at the end of life when comfort becomes a higher priority,” Heckman said. 

“Reducing the unnecessary use of antibiotics in care settings also has broader benefits, given its current overuse.” The study found that lower use of antibiotics in participating residents did not impact survival.

The study, detailing the researchers’ findings, was authored by Heckman, the University of Manitoba’s Allan Garland and a team of Canadian researchers. It was published in the journal Age and Ageing. The research was funded by the Canadian Frailty Network and Research Manitoba.

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JOURNAL

Age and Ageing

DOI

10.1093/ageing/afac049 

ARTICLE TITLE

BABEL (Better tArgeting, Better outcomes for frail ELderly patients) advance care planning: a comprehensive approach to advance care planning in nursing homes: a cluster randomised trial

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

23-Mar-2022

Rates of handgun carriage rise among US adolescents, particularly White, rural, and higher income teens, new study finds

Boston College researchers find gun carriage rates decreased among Black, American Indian and Alaskan Native, and lower income adolescents

Peer-Reviewed Publication

BOSTON COLLEGE

Chestnut Hill, Mass. (4/26/20220) – Handgun carrying increased significantly among rural, White and higher-income adolescents from 2002 to 2019, ominously escalating the risk of firearm-related death or injury for both these youths and others in their social sphere, researchers from Boston College’s Lynch School of Education and Human Development report in the latest edition of the journal Pediatrics.

The researchers found a 41 percent increase in rates of handgun carriage among youth overall, with White and higher income youth now most likely to report carriage.

Carriage rates among Black, American Indian and Alaska Native (AIAN), and lower-income adolescents decreased over the same timeframe. The report drew its data from the National Survey on Drug Use & Health, a cross-sectional, countrywide survey of adolescents ages 12-17, conducted annually from 2002-19.

Federal estimates based on the survey indicate that in 2019-20 there were an additional 200,000 adolescents reporting they have carried a firearm compared to 2002-03.

“While earlier handgun carriage research primarily focused on individual level risk factors, more recent inquiries on bearing and exposure to firearm violence have drawn attention to the importance of socio-demographic differences in carriage patterns, particularly those linked to differences in neighborhood or historical contexts, and place-based norms around bearing firearms,” report the study’s authors. “For example, U.S. southern and midwestern demographic groups tend to embrace more positive norms around gun carriage, and firearm bearing by adolescents is linked to peer and family customs around carriage.”

Titled “Prevalence of Adolescent Handgun Carriage: 2002-2019,” the investigation was conducted by Naoka E. Carey, J.D., a Ph.D. candidate in Applied Developmental and Educational Psychology, and Rebekah Levine Coley, Ph.D., a professor in the Lynch School’s Department of Counseling, Developmental and Educational Psychology. The study points to socio-demographic variables such as gender, education, ethnicity, religious affiliation and household income, as well as geographical location and related norms and customs as likely influencers.

Firearm injuries are the second-leading cause of death among children and adolescents, and the rates of adolescent firearm-related injuries or deaths have been on the rise, note the authors.  Furthermore, exposure to firearm injuries has long-term developmental implications for youth, and has been attributed to increased future injury rates and the likelihood of engagement in firearm crime. Handguns, in contrast to other firearms, are more likely to be employed in homicides, and handgun ownership is associated with an elevated suicide risk.

“Adolescent handgun carriage is increasing among particular adolescent subgroups, indicating a remarkable change over the past 17 years,” said Coley.  “Understanding such variations is critical to an understanding of fluctuating violence patterns, including rising rates of adolescent and rural suicide, and identifying which adolescents are at an increased risk of injury.  Lastly, lessons learned regarding adolescent behavior from the 1990s or early 2000s may be less relevant to a more socio-demographically diverse youth population today.”

The findings call for the development of intervention programs and policy solutions specific to the different adolescent subgroups, and which address the underlying structural and sociocultural — as well as the family and individual — factors of firearm bearing.

"Gun violence is now the leading cause of death for children in the U.S. and it is absolutely critical that we address it,” said Carey, a member of the Massachusetts Juvenile Justice and Policy Board and the former executive director of Massachusetts-based Citizens for Juvenile Justice. “To do that, policy needs to be informed by what teenagers are reporting they do today, not what they were doing 20 years ago or class- or race-based assumptions about which kids carry. We hope that our study can help inform future research, and help policymakers better address the root causes of violence and childhood injury, which may look different for different communities."

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JOURNAL

PEDIATRICS

DOI

10.1542/peds.2021-054472 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Data/statistical analysis

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

Prevalence of adolescent handgun carriage: 2002-2019

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

26-Apr-2022

Disclaimer: AAAS and Eure

Serious violence peaked after COVID-19 restrictions eased – report

New data shows 23% rise between 2020 and 2021 – the biggest jump since records began in 2001

Reports and Proceedings

CARDIFF UNIVERSITY

Serious violence increased by nearly a quarter following the easing of COVID-19 lockdown in England and Wales, according to a new report by Cardiff University.

The University’s Violence Research Group (VRG) found an estimated 146,856 people attended A&E for violence-related injury in 2021, up 23% from 2020. Violence peaked in August 2021, reaching pre-pandemic levels, the VRG’s 21st annual report states.

The increase represents the biggest yearly rise since records began in 2001 – however, overall rates of serious violence in 2021 were lower than in the years prior to the pandemic, with long-term trends showing a steady decline.

Despite concerns COVID-19 restrictions may have increased the risk of serious violence for women and girls, the researchers found no evidence of this.

The report’s authors also studied violence in Scotland for the first time, with an estimated 8,549 people attending emergency units for violence-related injury in 2021.

“The easing of restrictions after national COVID-19 related lockdown in England and Wales was linked to the biggest increase in serious violence in a single year since our records began 21 years ago,” said Professor Jonathan Shepherd, co-author of the report.

“The easing of restrictions in 2021 was associated with a significant increase in serious violence; by August pre-pandemic levels were reached.

“Our data are the only overall measure of serious violence during the pandemic and provide evidence of how restrictions affected this during a fascinating period. Our findings also point to prevention priorities, such as earlier and more precise targeting of police resources at violence hot spots identified from A&E data. Without this detailed information police are blind to when and where half of this serious violence takes place.”

Data gathered and analysed by the VRG from 74 emergency units in England and Wales showed that in the 12 months ending 31 December 2021, an estimated 146,856 people attended for treatment of violence-related injuries, up from 27,745 in 2020.

Serious violence increases affected all age groups – among children aged 0-10 by 42%, among adolescents aged 11-17 by 20%, among young adults aged 18-30 by 29%, among those aged 31-50 by 20%, and among those aged over 50 by 16%.

Those at highest risk of violence-related injury were males, who at 3.38 per 1,000 residents were more than twice at risk than females, and those aged 18-30 (6 per 1,000 residents).

Overall rates of serious violence in 2021 were lower than in the years before the pandemic, down 24% and 49% compared to 2017 and 2011, for example.

Professor Shepherd said: “The government’s 2019 assessment of public health contributions to violence prevention, signed by Sajid Javid when he was Home Secretary, concluded that even if just 5% of community safety partnerships used specified A&E data to guide their work – the tried and tested strategy known as the Cardiff Model – savings over 10 years would be almost £1bn.

“Serious violence is preventable, not inevitable.”

This 21st annual report on serious violence in England, Wales – and now Scotland – is produced by the Violence Research Group. It includes data from the National Violence Surveillance Network, led by Cardiff University’s Professor Vaseekaran Sivarajasingam.

-Ends-

• The report, Violence in England and Wales in 2021: An Accident & Emergency Perspective, is attached
• Professor Jonathan Shepherd is available for interview and can be contacted on 07779 490022 or shepherdjp@cardiff.ac.uk

For further information and interview requests contact: 

• Gerry Holt, comms & marketing, Cardiff University - 029 2087 5596 or Holtg2@cardiff.ac.uk

Cardiff University is recognised in independent government assessments as one of Britain’s leading teaching and research universities and is a member of the Russell Group of the UK’s most research-intensive universities. The 2014 Research Excellence Framework ranked the University 5th in the UK for research excellence. Among its academic staff are two Nobel Laureates, including the winner of the 2007 Nobel Prize for Medicine, Professor Sir Martin Evans. Founded by Royal Charter in 1883, today the University combines impressive modern facilities and a dynamic approach to teaching and research. The University’s breadth of expertise encompasses: the College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences; the College of Biomedical and Life Sciences; and the College of Physical Sciences and Engineering, along with a longstanding commitment to lifelong learning. Cardiff’s flagship Research Institutes are offering radical new approaches to pressing global problems. More at www.cardiff.ac.uk

Researchers scour Twitter to analyze public attitudes about COVID-19 vaccinations

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS CHICAGO

A new study from the University of Illinois Chicago examines key themes and topics from almost three million COVID-19 vaccine-related tweets posted by individuals and explores the trends and variations in public opinions and sentiments about vaccines and vaccination programs.

Covering four months of the pandemic, Jan. 1 to April 30, 2021, the researchers used topic modeling to explore the themes and topics underlying the tweets, and used sentiment analysis to compute sentiment scores and examine weekly trends. Their findings can be found in the journal JMIR Infodemiology.

“Our study is uniquely positioned and differs from many other similar studies, as we capture and use the tweets made by the general public, excluding those made by news outlets and other organizations,” said the study’s lead author Ranganathan Chandrasekaran, professor of information and decision sciences in the College of Business Administration and professor of biomedical and health information sciences in the College of Applied Health Sciences. “We have identified changes in public attitudes towards vaccination, key concerns about vaccination, reasons behind vaccine hesitancy and poor uptake of vaccines by certain groups.”

Some of the key findings include:

• The most-tweeted topic about COVID-19 vaccination was related to vaccination policy, specifically, whether vaccines needed to be mandated or optional (13.94%), followed by vaccine hesitancy (12.63%) and post-vaccination symptoms and effects (10.44%).

• The proportion of positive or overly positive tweets was always greater than that of negative or overly negative tweets in all of the weeks examined. Overall, 41.62% of the tweets had a positive sentiment, 31.16% had a negative sentiment and 27.22% had neutral sentiment scores.

• A large proportion of tweets about post-vaccination symptoms and side effects (40-45%) and those about conspiracy/hoax (35-45%) had negative or overly negative sentiments in all weeks of the examination. In contrast, greater proportions of tweets about vaccination disclosure (35-40%), vaccine efficacy (45-55%), clinical trials and approvals (30-40%), vaccine affordability (30-35%), vaccine regulation (30-35%), travel (35-45%), opinion leaders and endorsement (30-50%), and gratitude to health care workers (30-45%) carried positive or overly positive sentiments throughout the 16-week period of research.

The researchers’ qualitative analysis provided some preliminary insights into the reasons behind vaccine hesitancy, such as the shorter duration of the vaccine development cycle, concerns about the effectiveness of the vaccine in controlling the virus and its variants, and general mistrust of the pharmaceutical and medical industries and governments.

This type of research based on social media data can provide rich insights for policymakers and health officials to frame appropriate policies and programs for COVID-19 vaccination and accelerate vaccine uptake by the general public, according to the researchers.

Co-authors of the study are Rashi Desai, Harsh Shah and Vivek Kumar of UIC, and Evangelos Moustakas of Middlesex University.

The work was partly funded by the UIC College of Business Administration’s Summer Research Grant Program.

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JOURNAL

JMIR Infodemiology

DOI

10.2196/33909 

ARTICLE TITLE

Examining Public Sentiments and Attitudes Toward COVID-19 Vaccination: Infoveillance Study Using Twitter Posts

New study shows fewer people die from covid-19 in better vaccinated communities

Deaths more than 80% lower in communities with high vaccination coverage

Peer-Reviewed Publication

BMJ

A large US study published by The BMJ today finds that fewer people die from covid-19 in better vaccinated communities.

The findings, based on data across 2,558 counties in 48 US states, show that counties with high vaccine coverage had a more than 80% reduction in death rates compared with largely unvaccinated counties.

This large benefit complements the growing body of evidence indicating individual level benefits of covid-19 vaccination. A linked editorial also proposes that encouraging people to keep up to date with vaccination saves lives.

As of 11 April 2022, more than 11 billion covid-19 vaccine doses have been administered globally and the World Health Organization’s target is to vaccinate 70% of the world’s population by mid-2022.

Yet while previous vaccine studies have shown benefits at the individual level, the wider population level impact of scaling up covid-19 vaccination remains largely unknown.

To address this, researchers at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) set out to estimate how increasing county coverage of vaccines affected population level mortality and incidence of covid-19.

Their findings are based on more than 30 million cases of covid-19 and over 400,000 deaths linked to covid-19 across 2558 counties, which were reported during the second year of the pandemic, between December 2020 and December 2021.

They measured effectiveness by comparing reported covid-19 incidence and mortality rates in counties with very low (0-9%), low (10-39%), medium (40-69%), and high (70% or more) vaccination coverage - defined as the percentage of adults (aged 18 and over) who had received at least one dose of a covid-19 vaccine.

After taking account of potentially influential factors, the researchers found that increased vaccination coverage in counties was associated with reduced levels of covid-19 related mortality and cases.

For example, during the first half of 2021, when the alpha variant of coronavirus was dominant, the covid-19 mortality rate was reduced by 60%, 75%, and 81% in counties with low, medium, and high vaccination coverage, respectively, compared with counties that had very low coverage.

The corresponding figures for the reduction in cases were 57%, 70%, and 80%.

Similar reductions in mortality were also seen during the second half of 2021 when the delta variant became dominant in the US, although with smaller effects on case levels.

This is an observational study, so can’t establish cause and the researchers say several limitations should be considered when interpreting these data. For example, additional markers of severe disease, such as hospital admissions, were not explored and they did not control for factors such as rules on wearing a face mask masking and physical distancing at the time, which may have affected their results.

Nevertheless, they point out that results were similar after further sensitivity analyses, suggesting that they withstand scrutiny. And they say: “Future research may benefit from evaluating macroeconomic effects of improving population health, such as changes in employment rates and gross domestic product resulting from reopening society.”

This study adds to the evidence that vaccination can prevent infection and illness on a large scale, writes Professor Christopher Dye at the University of Oxford in a linked editorial.

“The findings of this study also make clear that many more lives could have been saved, and will be saved, by encouraging people to keep up to date with vaccination in the face of waning immunity and new coronavirus variants and by achieving even higher population coverage,” he adds.

“How many lives is a matter for others to explore. Meanwhile, this new study is another confidence booster for covid-19 vaccines,” he concludes.
[Ends]

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JOURNAL

The BMJ

DOI

10.1136/bmj‑2021‑069317 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Observational study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

Public health impact of covid-19 vaccines in the United States: observational study

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

27-Apr-2022