Journal of global health
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Journal of global health · Dec 2020
Meta AnalysisEffects of underlying morbidities on the occurrence of deaths in COVID-19 patients: A systematic review and meta-analysis.
Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), the most hectic pandemic of the era, is increasing exponentially and taking thousands of lives worldwide. This study aimed to assess the prevalence of pre-existing comorbidities among COVID-19 patients and their mortality risks with each category of pre-existing comorbidity. ⋯ This study provides evidence that COVID-19 patients with pre-existing comorbidities had a higher likelihood of death. These findings could potentially help health care providers to sort out the most susceptible COVID-19 patients by comorbidities, take precautionary measures during hospitalization, assess susceptibility to death, and prioritize their treatment, which could potentially reduce the number of fatalities in COVID-19.
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Journal of global health · Dec 2020
ReviewThe role of children in the transmission of SARS-CoV2: updated rapid review.
Understanding carriage and transmission potential of SARS-CoV-2 in children is of paramount importance to understand the spread of virus in school and community settings. ⋯ There is somewhat limited evidence available for quantifying the extent to which children may contribute to overall transmission, but the balance of evidence so far suggests that children and schools play only a limited role in overall transmission.
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Journal of global health · Dec 2020
Healthcare worker attendance during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic: A longitudinal analysis of fingerprint-verified data from all public-sector secondary and tertiary care facilities in Bangladesh.
The COVID-19 pandemic has overwhelmed hospitals in several areas in high-income countries. An effective response to this pandemic requires health care workers (HCWs) to be present at work, particularly in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) where they are already in critically low supply. To inform whether and to what degree policymakers in Bangladesh, and LMICs more broadly, should expect a drop in HCW attendance as COVID-19 continues to spread, this study aims to determine how HCW attendance has changed during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic in Bangladesh. ⋯ After a year of significant improvements, HCWs' attendance levels among nurses and other health care staff (who form the majority of Bangladesh's health care workforce) have declined during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic. This finding may portend an even greater decrease in attendance if COVID-19 continues to spread in Bangladesh. Policymakers in Bangladesh and similar LMICs should undertake major efforts to achieve high attendance levels among HCWs, particularly nurses, such as by providing sufficient personal protective equipment as well as monetary and non-monetary incentives.
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Journal of global health · Dec 2020
Investigation of 100 SARS-CoV-2 infected families in Wuhan: Transmission patterns and follow-up.
To prevent the spread of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), strict control of person-to-person transmission is essential. Family transmission is the most common route of transmission; however, family transmission patterns and outcomes are not well understood. ⋯ Our data found eight family transmission patterns, of which spousal transmission was the most common. Some patients were also found to have positive test results during follow-up.