Population ageing is an increasingly severe global issue. And this has been posing challenges for public health policies and medical resource allocation There are various features of population ...ageing in different regions worldwide.
All data were obtained from the health data of World Bank Open Data. Quantile linear regression was used to subtly measure the common variation tendency and strength of the global ageing rate and ageing population. The Bayesian space-time hierarchy model (BSTHM) was employed to assess the detailed spatial temporal evolution of ageing rate and ageing population in global 195 countries and regions.
Annual growth of the ageing (65 and above) rate occurred on six continents: Europe (0.1532%), Oceania (0.0873%), Asia (0.0834%), South America (0.0723%), North America (0.0673%) and Africa (0.0069%). The coefficient of variation of the global ageing rate increased from 0.54 in 1960 to 0.69 in 2017. The global ageing rate and ageing population increased over this period, correlating positively with their quantiles. Most countries (37/39) in Europe belong to the top level with regard to the ageing rate, including the countries with the greatest degree of ageing-Sweden, Germany, Austria, Belgium and the UK-whose spatial relative risks of ageing are 3.180 (3.113-3.214), 3.071 (3.018-3.122), 2.951 (2.903-3.001), 2.932 (2.880-2.984) and 2.917 (2.869-2.967), respectively. Worldwide, 44 low ageing areas which were distributed mainly in Africa (26 areas) and Asia (15 areas) experienced a decreasing trend of ageing rates. The local trends of ageing population in the 195 areas increased.
The differentiation of global population ageing is becoming increasingly serious. Globally, all 195 areas showed an increasing local ageing trend in absolute terms, although there were 44 low-ageing areas that experienced a decreasing local trend of ageing rate. The statistical results may provide some baseline reference for developing public health policies in various countries or regions, especially in less-developed areas.
Air pollution in the form of particulate matter (PM) is becoming one of the greatest current threats to human health on a global scale. This paper firstly presents a Bayesian space–time hierarch ...piecewise regression model (BSTHPRM) which can self-adaptively detect the transitions of local trends, accounting for spatial correlations. The spatiotemporal trends of the approximately anthropogenic PM2.5 removed natural dust (PM2.5_No Dust) concentrations and the corresponding population's PM2.5_No Dust exposure (PPM2.5E) in the global continent from 1998 to 2016 were investigated by the presented BSTHPRM. The total areas of the high and higher PM2.5_No Dust-polluted regions, whose spatial relative magnitude of PM2.5_NoDust pollution to the global continental overall level was between 1.89 and 14.68, accounted for about 13.4% of the global land area, and the corresponding exposed populations accounted for 56.0% of the global total population. The spatial heterogeneity of the global PM2.5_NoDust pollution increased generally from 1998 to 2016. The areas of hot, warm, and cold spots with increasing trends of PM2.5_NoDust concentration initially contracted and then later expanded. The local trends of the global continental PM2.5_NoDust concentrations and PPM2.5E can be parted into three changing stages, early, medium, and later stages, using the BSTHPRM. The area proportions of the regions experiencing a decreasing trend of PM2.5_NoDust concentrations and PPM2.5E were greater in the medium stage than in the early and later stages. The local trends of PM2.5_NoDust concentration and PPM2.5E in the two higher PM2.5_NoDust polluted areas, northern India and eastern and southern China, increased in the early stage and then decreased in the medium stage. In the later stage (recent years), northern India displayed a stronger increasing trend; nevertheless, the follow-up decreasing trend still occurred in eastern and southern China. In the first two stages, more than half of the areas in Europe experienced a decreasing trend of PM2.5_NoDust concentration and PPM2.5E; later, more than half of areas in Europe exhibited increasing trends in the later stage. North America and South America experienced a similar local trend of PPM2.5E to Europe. The PPM2.5E trend in Africa generally increased during the study period.
•First presentation of a Bayesian space-time hierarchy piecewise regression model detecting self-adaptively transitions.•Firstly applies a developed Bayesian space-time model in investigating the global population’s exposure to PM2.5.•Deeply analyses the spatiotemporal trends of the global continental PM2.5 pollution removed natural dust.•Details the spatiotemporal trends of the global population’s exposure to anthropogenic PM2.5.
Hand, foot and mouth disease (HFMD) has become a substantial threat recently. However few studies have quantified spatiotemporal heterogeneity of HFMD and detected spatiotemporal interactive effect ...of potential driving factors on this disease.
Using GeoDetector and Bayesian space-time hierarchy model, we characterized the epidemiology of HFMD in Henan, one of the largest population provinces in China, from 2012 to 2013, and quantified the impacts of potential driving factors.
Notably, 21.43 and 24.60% counties were identified as hot and cold spots, respectively. Spatially, the hotspots were mainly clustered in regions where the economic level was high. Temporally, the highest incidence period of HFMD was discovered to be in late spring and early summer. The impact of meteorological and socio-economic factors on the disease are significant, and this study found that a 1 °C rise in temperature was related to an increase of 4.09% in the HFMD incidence, a 1% increment in relative humidity was associated with a 1.77% increase of the disease, and a 1% increment in ratio of urban to rural population was associated with a 0.16% increase of the disease.
Meteorological and socio-economic factors presented significantly association with HFMD incidence, high-risk mainly appeared in large cities and their adjacent regions in hot and humid season. These findings will be helpful for HFMD risk control and disease-prevention policies implementation.
Abstract
Background
Typhoons greatly threaten human life and property, especially in China. Therefore, it is important to make effective policy decisions to minimize losses associated with typhoons.
...Methods
In this study, the GeoDetector method was used to quantify the determinant powers of natural and socioeconomic factors, and their interactions, on the population casualty rate of super typhoon Lekima. The local indicator of spatial association (LISA) method was followed to explore the spatial pattern of the population casualty rate under the influence of the identified dominant factors.
Results
Both natural and socioeconomic factors were found to have significantly impacted the population casualty rate due to super typhoon Lekima. Among the selected factors, maximum precipitation was dominant factor (
q
= 0.56), followed by maximum wind speed (
q
= 0.45). In addition, number of health technicians (
q
= 0.35) and number of health beds (
q
= 0.27) have a strong influence on the population casualty rate. Among the interactive effects of 12 influencing factors, the combined effects of maximum precipitation and ratio of brick-wood houses, the maximum precipitation and ratio of steel-concrete houses, maximum precipitation and number of health technicians were highest (
q
= 0.72). Furthermore, high-risk areas with very high casualty rates were concentrated in the southeastern part of Zhejiang and northern Shandong Provinces, while lower-risk areas were mainly distributed in northern Liaoning and eastern Jiangsu provinces.
Conclusions
These results contribute to the development of more specific policies aimed at safety and successful property protection according to the regional differences during typhoons.
To investigate the influence of different burial conditions on the seepage characteristics of loose sandstone in the leaching mining of sandstone uranium ore, this study applied different ground ...pressures and water pressures to rock samples at different burial depths to alter the rock's seepage characteristics. The permeability, pore distribution, and particle distribution characteristic parameters were determined, and the results showed that at the same burial depth, ground pressure had a greater effect on the reduction in permeability than water pressure. The patterns and mechanisms are as follows: under the influence of ground pressure, increasing the burial depth compresses the pores in the rock samples, decreases the proportion of effective permeable pores, and causes particle fragmentation, which blocks pore channels, resulting in a decrease in permeability. Under the influence of water pressure, increasing the burial depth expands the pores but also causes hard clay particles to decompose and block pore channels. As the burial depth increases, the particles eventually decompose completely, and the permeability initially decreases and then increases. In this experiment, the relationships between permeability and the proportion of pores larger than 0.15 μm and the proportion of particles smaller than 59 μm were found to be the most significant.
Located in an important biodiversity conservation area in the Yangtze River Delta, the habitats of many species have been severely eroded because of human activities such as tourism development. ...There is no relevant species conservation plan in place in the region, and scientific guidance on ecosystem change and corridor construction is urgently needed. In this study, we first assess ecosystem service functions based on the InVEST model; then, we assess ecological sensitivity and identify landscape resistance surfaces by constructing ecosystem sensitivity indicators; finally, we construct ecological security patterns by combining landscape resistance surfaces and circuit theory identification. The main results are as follows: (1) The high value area of ecosystem services is located in the southwest, while the northeast part of the study area has lower ecosystem services, and there is a trade-off between the ecosystem services in the study area. (2) There are 38 ecological sources in southern Anhui, with a total area of more than 5742.79 km2, that are the basic guarantees of ecological security, mainly located in the northeast of the study area, and woodland and grassland are the most important components, accounting for 18.4% of the total study area. (3) The ecological security pattern in the study area consists of 63 ecological sources, 37 important corridors, and 26 potential corridors, of which there are 28 pinch point areas and 6 barrier point patches in the study area, mainly located within Huangshan City and Xuancheng City. We recommend that when implementing restoration and rehabilitation measures in the future, policy makers should give priority to pinch points and barrier areas.
China is in a critical air quality management stage. Rapid industrial development and urbanization has resulted in non‐ignorable air pollution, which seriously endangers human health. Assessment of ...the health impacts and economic losses of air pollution is essential for the prevention and control policy formulation. Based on ozone (O3) and fine particulate matter concentration (PM2.5) monitoring data in 331 Chinese cities from 2015 to 2020, this study evaluated the health effects and the corresponding economic losses of O3 and PM2.5 pollution on three health endpoints. The ratio of population exposed to O3 levels that exceeded the Chinese Ambient Air Quality Standards (CAAQS) increased from 13.35% in 2015 to 14.15% in 2020, which resulted in 133,415 (2015) ‐ 156,173 (2020) all‐cause deaths, 88,941 (2015) ‐ 104,051 (2020) cardiovascular deaths, and 28,614 (2015) ‐ 33,456 (2020) respiratory deaths. The ratio of population exposed to PM2.5 levels that exceeded the CAAQS decreased, but in many regions, especially in North China and the Yangtze River Delta, the PM2.5 concentration remained high. By 2020, nearly half of the population in China was still exposed to PM2.5 levels that exceeded the CAAQS, and the corresponding economic losses reached CNY 3.46 and 3.05 billion, respectively. These results improved the understanding of the spatial‐temporal variation trends of major air pollutants at city scale in China, and emphasize the continued coordination urgently needed for controlling O3 and PM2.5 following the implementation of the 2013 policy to mitigate air pollution to protect human health.
Plain Language Summary
Based on ozone (O3) and fine particulate matter concentration monitoring data in 331 Chinese cities from 2015 to 2020, this study adopted the health impact assessment model to evaluate the health effects of O3 and PM2.5 pollution on three health endpoints: premature, cardiovascular and respiratory mortality.
Key Points
PM2.5 showed a significant decrease but still severe impacts on human health
Ozone (O3) is posing an increasingly serious threat to human health and economic loss in China
Coordinated control of PM2.5 and O3 is essential
Bacillary dysentery remains a public health concern in the world. Hunan Province is one of the provinces having the highest risk of bacillary dysentery in China, however, the spatial-temporal ...distribution, variation of bacillary dysentery and sensitivity to meteorological factors in there are unclear. In this paper, a Bayesian space-time hierarchical model (BSTHM) was used to detect space-time variation, and effects of meteorological factors between 2010 and 2015. The risk of bacillary dysentery showed apparent spatial-temporal heterogeneity. The highest risk occurred in the summer season. Economically undeveloped mountainous areas in the west and south of the province had the highest incidence rates. Twenty three (18.9%) and 20 (16.4%) counties were identified as hot and cold spots, respectively. Among the hotspots, 11 counties (47.8%) exhibited a rapidly decreasing trend, suggesting they may become low-risk areas in the future. Of the cold spot counties, six (30%) showed a slowly decreasing trend, and may have a higher risk in the future. Among meteorological factors, air temperature, relative humidity, and wind speed all played a significant role in the spatial-temporal distribution of bacillary dysentery risk. These findings can contribute to the implementation of an early warning system for controlling and preventing bacillary dysentery.
The incidence of hand, foot and mouth disease (HFMD) varies over space and time and this variability is related to climate and social-economic factors. Majority of studies on HFMD were carried out in ...humid regions while few have focused on the disease in arid/semi-arid regions, more research in such climates would potentially make the mechanism of HFMD transmission clearer under different climate conditions.
In this paper, we explore spatial-temporal distribution of HFMD in Ningxia province, which has an arid/semi-arid climate in northwest China. We first employed a Bayesian space-time hierarchy model (BSTHM) to assess the spatial-temporal heterogeneity of the HFMD cases and its relationship with meteorological factors in Ningxia from 2009 to 2013, then used a novel spatial statistical software package GeoDetector to test the spatial-temporal heterogeneity of HFMD risk.
The results showed that the spatial relative risks in northern part of Ningxia were higher than those in the south. The highest temporal risk of HFMD incidence was in fall season, with a secondary peak in spring. Meteorological factors, such as average temperature, relative humidity, and wind speed played significant roles in the spatial-temporal distribution of HFMD risk.
The study provide valuable information on HFMD distribution in arid/semi-arid areas in northwest China and facilitate understanding of the concentration of HFMD.
Tailoring the electronic metal-support interaction (EMSI) has attracted considerable interests as one of the most efficient approaches to improve both the activity and stability of metal catalysts in ...heterogeneous catalysis. In this viewpoint, we illustrate the methodology and relevant fundamentals on the disentanglement, characterization, and interpretation of EMSI. Under the choice of monometallic catalyst over inert support, a combination of optimal experiment design, multimodal techniques, in situ characterization, with a comprehensive understanding of the underlying measurement protocols is highly desirable for a reliable determination of EMSI. Accordingly, not only the d-band filling but also d-band energy within the EMSI should be taken into consideration for providing general principles to guide the electron-promoting catalytic reaction.
Display omitted
•Fundamentals on the disentanglement, characterization, and interpretation of EMSI.•The prevailing debates on the determination of EMSI are discussed.•A strategy of stepwise defunctionalization of carbon support is suggested.
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