National survey of mental health and life satisfaction of gig workers: the role of loneliness and financial precarity.

Objectives: To compare the mental health and life satisfaction of those employed in the gig work and contingent work with those in full-time or part-time work and the unemployed in the UK during the COVID-19 pandemic. To explore the possible mechanisms of latent and manifest benefits of employment, such as financial precarity and loneliness.

Design: Cross-sectional survey.

Addressing COVID-19 in humanitarian settings: a call to action.

Refugees and internally displaced persons in humanitarian settings are particularly susceptible to the spread of infectious illnesses such as COVID-19 due to overcrowding and inadequate access to clean water, sanitation, and hygiene facilities. Countries facing conflict or humanitarian emergencies often have damaged or fragmented health systems and little to no capacity to test, isolate, and treat COVID-19 cases. Without a plan to address COVID-19 in humanitarian settings, host governments, aid agencies, and international organizations risk prolonging the spread of the virus across borders, threatening global health security, and devastating vulnerable populations.

The economic burden of cancer care for Syrian refugees: a population-based modelling study.

Background: Cancer represents a substantial health burden for refugees and host countries. However, no reliable data on the costs of cancer care for refugees are available, which limits the planning of official development assistance in humanitarian settings. We aimed to model the direct costs of cancer care among Syrian refugee populations residing in Jordan, Lebanon, and Turkey.

The Profile of Non-Communicable Disease (NCD) research in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region: Analyzing the NCD burden, research outputs and international research collaboration.

Objectives: Despite the rising risk factor exposure and non-communicable disease (NCD) mortality across the Middle East and the North African (MENA) region, public health policy responses have been slow and appear discordant with the social, economic and political circumstances in each country. Good health policy and outcomes are intimately linked to a research-active culture, particularly in NCD. In this study we present the results of a comprehensive analysis of NCD research with particular a focus on cancer, diabetes and cardiovascular disease in 10 key countries that represent a spectrum across MENA between 1991 and 2018.

Correction to: Informal healthcare provision in Lebanon: an adaptive mechanism among displaced Syrian health professionals in a protracted crisis.

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.1186/s13031-019-0224-y.].

Informal healthcare provision in Lebanon: an adaptive mechanism among displaced Syrian health professionals in a protracted crisis.

Background: Syrian healthcare workers (HCWs) are among those who fled the Syrian conflict only to face further social and economic challenges in host countries. In Lebanon, this population group cannot formally practice, yet many are believed to be operating informally. These activities remain poorly documented and misunderstood by the academic, policy and humanitarian communities.

A shorter working week for everyone: How much paid work is needed for mental health and well-being?

There are predictions that in future rapid technological development could result in a significant shortage of paid work. A possible option currently debated by academics, policy makers, trade unions, employers and mass media, is a shorter working week for everyone. In this context, two important research questions that have not been asked so far are: what is the minimum amount of paid employment needed to deliver some or all of the well-being and mental health benefits that employment has been shown to bring? And what is the optimum number of working hours at which the mental health of workers is at its highest? To answer these questions, this study used the UK Household Longitudinal Study (2009-2018) data from individuals aged between 16 and 64.

What do the British public think of inequality in health, wealth, and power?

Despite the importance of public opinion for policy formation and the political salience of inequality, the public's views about the desirability of equality, not only in health but also in economics and politics, has attracted little attention. We report the results of an on-line survey administered in late 2016 in Great Britain (N = 1667 with a response rate of 35-50%). The survey allowed for testing the sensitivity of public opinion across two other variables: absolute versus relative (everyone should have the same versus inequality should be reduced) and bivariate versus univariate (inequality in one domain is judged in relation to inequality in another versus inequality in a domain is judged independently of other domains).

Health workers and the weaponisation of health care in Syria: a preliminary inquiry for The Lancet-American University of Beirut Commission on Syria.

The conflict in Syria presents new and unprecedented challenges that undermine the principles and practice of medical neutrality in armed conflict. With direct and repeated targeting of health workers, health facilities, and ambulances, Syria has become the most dangerous place on earth for health-care providers. The weaponisation of health care-a strategy of using people's need for health care as a weapon against them by violently depriving them of it-has translated into hundreds of health workers killed, hundreds more incarcerated or tortured, and hundreds of health facilities deliberately and systematically attacked.

Communicable disease surveillance and control in the context of conflict and mass displacement in Syria.

Objectives: To describe trends in major communicable diseases in Syria during the ongoing conflict, and the challenges to communicable disease surveillance and control in the context of dynamic, large-scale population displacement, unplanned mass gatherings, and disruption to critical infrastructure.

Methods: A rapid review of the peer-reviewed and non-peer-reviewed literature from 2005 to 2015 was performed, augmented by secondary analysis of monitoring data from two disease early warning systems currently operational in Syria, focusing mainly on three diseases: tuberculosis (TB), measles, and polio.

Results: Trend data show discrepancies in case report numbers between government and non-government controlled areas, especially for TB, but interpretation is hampered by uncertainties over sentinel surveillance coverage and base population numbers.

Syria: health in a country undergoing tragic transition.

Objectives: To document the ongoing destruction as a result of the tragic events in Syria, to understand the changing health care needs and priorities of Syrians.

Methods: A directed examination of the scientific literature and reports about Syria before and during the Syrian conflict, in addition to analyzing literature devoted to the relief and rebuilding efforts in crisis situations.

Results: The ongoing war has had high direct war casualty, but even higher suffering due to the destruction of health system, displacement, and the breakdown of livelihood and social fabric.