Community-Based Approaches to Increase COVID-19 Vaccine Uptake and Demand: Lessons Learned from Four UNICEF-Supported Interventions.

Vaccination is critical to minimize serious illness and death from COVID-19. Yet uptake of COVID-19 vaccines remains highly variable, particularly among marginalized communities. This article shares lessons learned from four UNICEF interventions that supported Governments to generate acceptance and demand for COVID-19 vaccines in Zambia, Iraq, Ghana, and India.

Measuring behavioral and social drivers of COVID-19 vaccination in health workers in Eastern and Southern Africa.

Background: In 2021, twenty out of twenty-one countries in the Eastern and Southern Africa (ESA) region introduced COVID-19 vaccines. With variable willingness to uptake vaccines across countries, the aim of the present study was to better understand factors that impact behavioral and social drivers of vaccination (BeSD). Using the theory-based "increasing vaccination model", the drivers Thinking & Feeling, Social Processes, Motivation, and Practical Issues were adapted to the COVID-19 context and utilized in a cross-country assessment.

Integrated analysis of online signals and insight generation about digital conversations on COVID-19 vaccines in Eastern and Southern Africa: a longitudinal analysis of social listening data.

Background: During the COVID-19 pandemic, social listening programs across digital channels have become an integral part of health preparedness and response planning, allowing to capture and address questions, information needs, and misinformation shared by users. This study identifies key social listening trends around COVID-19 vaccines in Eastern and Southern Africa and analyses how online conversations about this issue evolved over time.

Methods: A taxonomy developed and refined in collaboration with social and behaviour change teams was used to filter online conversations into nine subtopic categories.

[Brain food reward alterations in obesity].

Obesity, defined by body fat excess, results from a food intake which exceeds energy needs. The control of this intake is compromised in people suffering from obesity. There is a disturbance of the food reward brain network, in the form of an abnormal reactivity to visual and gustatory food signals and a disrupted influence of the state of hunger on its activity as well as an alteration in the dopaminergic neurotransmission.

Validation and Psychometric Assessment of the Practice Environment Scale of the Nursing Work Index in the Portuguese Hospital Context.

Background: The nursing work environment has an impact on patient safety outcomes and its measurement should be a regular practice.

Purpose: To assess the reliability and construct validity of the Practice Environment Scale of the Nursing Work Index in the Portuguese context.

Methods: An exploratory factor analysis followed by a confirmatory factor analysis to assess model adjustment quality was performed with a sample of 3,686 nurses.

Short-term association between exposure to ozone and mortality in Oporto, Portugal.

Exposures to air pollution in developed countries have generally decreased over the last two decades. However, many recent epidemiological studies have consistently shown positive associations between low-level exposure to air pollutants and health outcomes. In Portugal, very few studies have analysed the acute effect of air pollutants on health.

[Self-reported hearing-loss in the Portuguese population: evidence from the 4th National Health Survey].

Unlabelled: Hearing loss is associated with a negative social impact, which implies a lower quality of life. Despite its negative consequences the prevalence of hearing loss in the Portuguese population is not well known.

Objective: The aim of this study was to assess the prevalence of self-reported hearing loss, in a representative sample of the Portuguese population.