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Thailand and SE Asia’s first Pint of Science Festival kicked Pint-of-Science1 off on Mon 15 May with a look at Killer Bugs: Disease, Detection and Destruction and an enthusiastic reception from over 50 attendees that included scientists from MORU and other institutions, business people with a background in science and students.
Louis Pasteur, COVID-19, and the social challenges of epidemics
MORU Bangkok
Posted 23/12/2022. December 2022 sees two notable anniversaries: the 200th anniversary of the birth of Louis Pasteur and the third anniversary of China's announcement of the COVID-19 outbreak. On these coinciding events, Phaik Yeong Cheah and colleagues reflect on past and current global challenges to bring epidemics under control.
The wrongful indictment of pre-referral rectal artesunate further delays the roll-out of this lifesaving drug
MORU Bangkok
Posted 22/12/2022. On Jan 27, 2022, WHO recommended a moratorium on the deployment of rectal artesunate suppositories for severe malaria and in doing so stopped the roll-out of a lifesaving intervention. The decision is based on data from a large demonstration project CARAMAL. Lorenz von Seidlein discusses the project and its consequences with two leaders of the project in a point- counterpoint published in the Lancet infectious Diseases.
Technical evaluation and usability of a quantitative G6PD POC test in cord blood: a mixed-methods study in a low-resource setting
SMRU
Posted 20/12/2022. G6PD deficiency is a major risk factor for severe neonatal jaundice among neonates born at the Thailand-Myanmar border. Early identification of G6PD deficiency can dramatically improve clinical care. In this study Germana Bancone and colleagues showed that a new point-of-care quantitative G6PD test used by trained midwives can reliably identify neonates with abnormal G6PD at birth.
Village malaria workers for the community-based management of vivax malaria
MORU Bangkok
Posted 16/12/2022. Radical cure of vivax malaria with primaquine requires testing for glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase deficiency, which is currently not provided at the community level in Cambodia. In this article, Bipin Adhikari and colleagues describe the core components needed for implementing radical cure at the community, which will increase coverage important for rapid vivax malaria elimination.
Malaria outbreak in Laos driven by a selective sweep for Plasmodium falciparum kelch13 R539T mutants: a genetic epidemiology analysis
LOMWRU MORU Bangkok
Malaria outbreaks can be driven by genetic selection rather than environmental or behavioural causes. Varanya Wasakul, Olivo Miotto and colleagues investigated a Plasmodium falciparum outbreak in Attapeu, Laos, in 2020-2021, using genomic epidemiology methods to elucidate parasite population dynamics, identify the outbreak’s causes and reconstruct the origin of the circulating strains.
Orientia tsutsugamushi in Chiggers and Small Mammals in Laos
LOMWRU MORU Bangkok
Posted 06/12/2011. Scrub typhus is an important cause of febrile illness in Laos. Ivo Elliott and colleagues collected, identified and tested small mammals hosts and vector chigger mites for Orientia tsutsugamushi, the causative pathogen. A single pool of chiggers tested PCR positive and 16/52 (31%) of small mammals were seropositive. These are the first molecular and serological data on O. tsutsugamushi in vectors and non-human hosts from Laos.
Pregnancy outcomes after first-trimester treatment with artemisinin derivatives versus non-artemisinin antimalarials: a systematic review and individual patient data meta-analysis
SMRU
Posted 29/11/22. Makoto Saito and colleagues evaluated the fetal safety of antimalarials in the first trimester of pregnancy. Pregnant women who were treated with artemisinin-based combination therapy (ACT) in the first trimester had fewer fetal losses and congenital anomalies than quinine-treated women. Updated WHO guidelines recommend ACT, particularly artemether-lumefantrine, for all trimesters.
Ownership of individual-level health data, data sharing, and data governance
MORU Bangkok
Posted 22/11/2022. Who owns individual-level health data collected from health research and clinical care? In this paper Phaik Yeong Cheah and Jan Piasecki argues that neither public ownership nor private ownership will allow us to resolve all the problems associated with effective, equitable, and ethical use of data.
Cardiovascular Concentration-Effect Relationships of Amodiaquine and its Metabolite Desethylamodiaquine: Clinical and Pre-clinical Studies
MORU Bangkok
Posted 21/10/2022. Amodiaquine is an important antimalarial widely used for the treatment and prevention of malaria, protecting millions of African children every year. Xin Hui Chan and colleagues characterised the concentration-dependency of the bradycardic, hypotensive, and QT-prolonging effects of amodiaquine and its active metabolite desethylamodiaquine in clinical and pre-clinical studies, providing evidence of their causal role.
Trust is the common denominator for COVID-19 vaccine acceptance: A literature review
MORU Bangkok
Posted 18/10/2022. Trust is perhaps the most frequently attributed element in decision making for vaccine uptake. But what is trust, and how does it affect vaccine decision? In this qualitative review, Bipin Adhikari and colleagues explored how decisions on vaccine uptake are made, the role of trust and ways to build it.
Barriers to Quality Perioperative Care Delivery in Low- and Middle-Income Countries: A Qualitative Rapid Appraisal Study
MORU Bangkok
Posted 05/10/2022. Sutharshan Vengadasalam, Timo Tolppa and colleagues employed pathway mapping, ethnography, and interviews in Colombia, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Tanzania and Uganda, and found four common barriers to the delivery of quality perioperative care - Fragmented care pathways, limited human and structural resources, direct and indirect costs, and patients' low expectations of care.
Glucose 6 Phosphate Dehydrogenase (G6PD) quantitation using biosensors at the point of first contact: a mixed method study in Cambodia
MORU Bangkok
Posted 07/10/2022. G6PD measurement is critical before including primaquine or tafenoquine in the treatment for vivax malaria. Bipin Adhikari and colleagues explored whether first line health care providers can safely handle G6PD biosensors in the rural Cambodia. Our findings suggest that the radical cure for vivax malaria can be safely administered at the point of first contact, thus preventing relapse and continued transmission in a much larger population than through hospital based management.
Ethical considerations in deploying triple artemisinin-based combination therapies for malaria: An analysis of stakeholders’ perspectives in Burkina Faso and Nigeria
MORU Bangkok
Posted 21/09/2022. Phaik Yeong Cheah and colleagues asked malaria stakeholders in Burkina Faso and Nigeria: What are the key ethical considerations to be considered in the deployment of Triple Artemisinin-based Combination Therapies for malaria in Africa when artemisinin combination therapies are effective in most of Africa?
Outdoor residual spraying for malaria vector-control in Kayin (Karen) state, Myanmar: A cluster randomized controlled trial
SMRU
Posted 14/09/2022. Victor Chaumeau and colleagues evaluated the efficacy of outdoor residual spraying for malaria vector control on the Thailand-Myanmar border. Intervention was showed to rapidly interrupt transmission in a setting where the vectors bite mostly outdoors and at a time when people are not protected by mosquito bed nets.
The quality of veterinary medicines and their implications for One Health
MORU Bangkok
Posted 31/08/2022. Substandard and falsified anti-infectives used in human and animals are common, especially in Low- and Middle-Income countries, leading to poor clinical outcomes, adverse drug reactions, economic losses, mistrust in health systems and potentially leading to AMR emergence and spread. One Health research is needed to assess their impact on AMR, by Celine Caillet and colleagues.
Perioperative Care Pathways in Low- and Lower-Middle-Income Countries: Systematic Review and Narrative Synthesis
MORU Bangkok
Posted 09/08/2022. Timo Tolppa and CCAA colleagues reviewed the literature on perioperative care pathways in resource-poor settings and found that pathways are increasingly used there with an aim to improve care quality. Patient and clinician beliefs were a major challenge in care pathway implementation, whereas facilitators included context-relevant adaptations, strong evidence-base and teamwork.
A family cluster of cutaneous Leishmania major infection unresponsive to intralesional meglumine antimonial: Case reports
MORU Bangkok
Posted 12/08/2022. This small series describes four family members who contracted cutaneous leishmaniasis due to Leishmania major that did not improve in two patients and worsened in the other two despite 4 weeks of intralesional meglumine antimoniate. All responded to a 4-week course of oral ketoconazole. The paper provides an interesting discussion, by Bob Taylor and colleagues
Improving the diagnosis of severe malaria in African children using platelet counts and plasma PfHRP2 concentrations
MORU Bangkok
Posted 02/08/2022. Severe malaria is difficult to diagnose in high malaria transmission areas because of the high coincidence of malaria with other febrile illnesses. James Watson and colleagues analysed platelet counts and plasma PfHRP2 concentrations from >2000 severely ill children and show that around a third of children diagnosed with severe malaria have in fact another cause of illness.
Decentralised hepatitis C testing and treatment in rural Cambodia: evaluation of a simplified service model integrated in an existing public health system
MORU Bangkok
Posted 28/07/2022. Meiwen Zhang and Tom Peto start a prevalence survey, including Hepatitis B and Hepatitis C, among the rural population in Bangladesh, Cambodia, and Thailand. In 2021 Meiwen and colleagues published a pilot implementation project on hepatitis C testing and treatment in rural Cambodia.
“Like a wake-up call for humankind”: Views, challenges, and coping strategies related to public health measures during the first COVID-19 lockdown in Thailand
MORU Bangkok
Posted 26/07/2022. In this paper, Phaik Yeong Cheah and colleagues describe the challenges and coping strategies related to public health measures during the first COVID-19 lockdown in Thailand. Major challenges identified included financial hardship, social isolation and loneliness. Coping strategies included turning to religion, practicing acceptance and ‘making merit’ (Tham-bun in Thai).