Investigating stigma during the COVID-19 pandemic: Living conditions, social determinants and experiences of infection among employees at a tertiary referral cancer centre.

Aim: Healthcare workers (HCWs) have reported negative social experiences during the COVID-19 pandemic; however, this data is largely from medical personnel. We examined living conditions, social determinants, and experiences during the COVID-19 pandemic among all cadres of employees who had recovered from COVID-19 at a tertiary referral cancer hospital in India.

Methods: We conducted a mixed methods study combining a questionnaire-based survey followed by semi-structured interviews with open-ended questions, among hospital staff who recovered from COVID-19 between April and November 2020.

Is DAPI assay of cellular nucleic acid reliable in the presence of protein aggregates?

DAPI is used extensively to identify and quantify DNA in cellular systems assuming its exclusive staining of nucleic acids. However, the present results show that DAPI has much higher affinity towards protein aggregates than DNA. Thus, the use of DAPI for the nucleic acid assay of cellular systems with protein aggregates may not be very reliable.