Administrative Divisions In China Research Articles

Mutations and intron polymorphisms in voltage-gated sodium channel genes of different geographic populations of Culex pipiens pallens/Culex pipiens quinquefasciatus in China

BackgroundCulex pipiens pallens and Culex pipiens quinquefasciatus are the dominant species of Culex mosquitoes in China and important disease vectors. Long-term use of insecticides can cause mutations in the voltage-gated sodium channel (vgsc) gene of mosquitoes, but little is known about the current status and evolutionary origins of vgsc gene in different geographic populations. Therefore, this study aimed to determine the current status of vgsc genes in Cx. p. pallens and Cx. p. quinquefasciatus in China and to investigate the evolutionary inheritance of neighboring downstream introns of the vgsc gene to determine the impact of insecticides on long-term evolution.MethodsSampling was conducted from July to September 2021 in representative habitats of 22 provincial-level administrative divisions in China. Genomic DNA was extracted from 1308 mosquitoes, the IIS6 fragment of the vgsc gene on the nerve cell membrane was amplified using polymerase chain reaction, and the sequence was used to evaluate allele frequency and knockdown resistance (kdr) frequency. MEGA 11 was used to construct neighbor-joining (NJ) tree. PopART was used to build a TCS network.ResultsThere were 6 alleles and 6 genotypes at the L1014 locus, which included the wild-type alleles TTA/L and CTA/L and the mutant alleles TTT/F, TTC/F, TCT/S and TCA/S. The geographic populations with a kdr frequency less than 20.00% were mainly concentrated in the regions north of 38° N, and the geographic populations with a kdr frequency greater than 80.00% were concentrated in the regions south of 30° N. kdr frequency increased with decreasing latitude. And within the same latitude, the frequency of kdr in large cities is relatively high. Mutations were correlated with the number of introns. The mutant allele TCA/S has only one intron, the mutant allele TTT/F has three introns, and the wild-type allele TTA/L has 17 introns.ConclusionsCx. p. pallens and Cx. p. quinquefasciatus have developed resistance to insecticides in most regions of China. The neighboring downstream introns of the vgsc gene gradually decreased to one intron with the mutation of the vgsc gene. Mutations may originate from multiple mutation events rather than from a single origin, and populations lacking mutations may be genetically isolated.Graphical

Trade-off or synergy? Dynamic analysis and policy insights on land use functions in China

Limited land resources and diverse utilization have resulted in complex trade-offs and synergies (TS) among land use functions (LUFs). Analyzing these TS and their spatio-temporal variations is crucial for developing effective land use policies to regulate and manage multiple LUFs, promoting efficient land resource utilization and fostering sustainable development in society, economy, and ecology. This study uses interdisciplinary research methods, including the projection pursuit model, Spearman's rank correlation analysis, and exploratory spatial data analysis, to investigate the characteristics of LUFs TS in 31 provincial administrative divisions in China from 2009 to 2020. Key findings include: (1) LUFs exhibited significant spatial heterogeneity and temporal variations. Most LUFs experienced distinct upgrading processes, except for SSF (Social Security Function), which requires specific attention.(2) LUFs TS were found to be common and consistent, with varying characteristics observed in different years. It is crucial to consider these characteristics during the process of functional regulation to enhance effectiveness. (3) We confirmed that LUFs, as a public service, show substantial spatial spillover effects, resulting in cross-regional LUFs TS. Regulatory strategies should harness the radiating and propelling effects of advantageous functions while maintaining equilibrium and coordination in regional development, ultimately achieving optimal overall benefits. Finally, we discuss the study findings in comparison with existing research and provide policy insights to promote the harmonized and sustainable development of LUFs. These findings aim to serve as a scientific foundation for land use planning and management in China and offer valuable insights for other regions.

Factors associated with recommendation behaviors of four non-National Immunization Program vaccines: a cross-sectional survey among public health workers in China

BackgroundImmunization is a crucial preventive measure to safeguard children under five years old against a range of diseases. In China, the coverage rate of non-National Immunization Program (non-NIP) vaccines can be improved by leveraging the recommendation from public health workers. Hence, understanding the influencing factors of recommendation behaviors assume paramount importance. This study aims to investigate influencing factors of public health workers' recommendation behaviors towards non-NIP vaccines, with a particular emphasis on financial incentives.MethodsA cross-sectional survey was conducted using a multi-stage sampling method in 2019 from August to October. 627 public health workers were recruited from 148 community healthcare centers in ten provincial-level administrative divisions in China. An anonymous questionnaire was used to collect demographic information, attitudes towards vaccination, and recommendation behaviors towards non-NIP vaccines, including Haemophilus influenzae type b (Hib) vaccine, pneumococcal conjugate vaccine, varicella vaccine, and rotavirus vaccine. Descriptive analysis and multivariate logistic regression analysis were adopted in this study.ResultsOf the 610 public health workers with complete survey data, 53.8%, 57.4%, 84.1%, and 54.1% often recommended Hib vaccine, pneumococcal pneumonia vaccine (PCV), varicella vaccine, and rotavirus vaccine, respectively. Logistic regression revealed that gender (Hib vaccine: OR = 0.4, 95% CI: 0.2–0.8; PCV: OR = 0.4, 95% CI: 0.2–0.8; rotavirus vaccine: OR = 0.3, 95% CI: 0.2–0.6), financial incentives for non-NIP vaccination (Hib vaccine: OR = 1.9, 95% CI: 1.1–3.6; PCV: OR = 2.1, 95% CI: 1.1–3.9; rotavirus vaccine: OR = 2.0, 95% CI: 1.1–3.8) and perception of vaccine safety (Hib vaccine: OR = 2.7, 95% CI: 1.1–7.0; PCV: OR = 3.2, 95% CI: 1.2–8.0; rotavirus vaccine: OR = 3.0, 95% CI: 1.2–7.7) were associated with public health workers’ recommendation towards Hib vaccine, PCV and rotavirus vaccine.ConclusionsThe findings highlighted public health workers’ recommendation behaviors of non-NIP vaccines in China and revealed strong association between vaccine recommendation and financial incentives. This highlights the importance of financial incentives in public health workers’ recommendation toward non-NIP vaccines in China. Proper incentives are recommended for public health workers to encourage effective health promotion in immunization practices.Graphical

Spatial differences and influence mechanisms of construction land development intensity in China, 2002–2020

Construction land development intensity is a spatial mapping of modern urbanization level, which integrally reflects urban development strategy, land use efficiency, and population carrying intensity. This article analyzed the spatial and temporal evolution of construction land development intensity using panel data of 31 provincial administrative divisions in China from 2002 to 2020, with the application of the Theil index and spatial autocorrelation. To further investigate the relationship between human activities and land development, the article used geographic detectors to analyze the influencing mechanisms. The results showed that: (1) The average intensity of construction land development of Chinese provinces from 2002 to 2020 showed a trend of "steady increase, a short decline, and then a steady increase," and there were significant differences in the characteristics of construction land development intensity changes in different regions. (2) The regional differences in construction land development intensity between provinces showed a decreasing trend. There were uneven differences among regions, with more minor regional differences in Central, South, and North China but more significant differences in Northwest, East, Southwest, and Northeast China. (3) The spatial agglomeration of construction land development intensity in the region increased initially and then decreased during the study period. The overall pattern was "small agglomeration and large dispersion." (4) Economic development factors such as GDP per land, industrial structure, and fixed asset investment completion significantly affect land development intensity. The interaction between the factors was apparent, and the effect of “1 + 1 > 2” was produced. Based on the study's results, it is suggested that scientific regional development planning, guiding inter-provincial factor flow, and rational control of land development efforts are the key to promoting sustainable regional development.

Association between genetic predisposition and disease burden of stroke in China: a genetic epidemiological study

Stroke ranks second worldwide and first in China as a leading cause of death and disability. It has a polygenic architecture and is influenced by environmental and lifestyle factors. However, it remains unknown as to whether and how much the genetic predisposition of stroke is associated with disease burden. Allele frequency from the whole genome sequencing data in the Chinese Millionome Database of 141,418 individuals and trait-specific polygenic risk score models were applied to estimate the provincial genetic predisposition to stroke, stroke-related risk factors and stroke-related drug response. Disease burden including mortality, disability-adjusted life years (DALYs), years of life lost(YLLs), years lived with disability (YLDs) and prevalence in China was collected from the Global Burden Disease study. The association between stroke genetic predisposition and the epidemiological burden was assessed and then quantified in both regression-based models and machine learning-based models at a provincial resolution. Among the 30 administrative divisions in China, the genetic predisposition of stroke was characterized by a north-higher-than-south gradient (p<0.0001). Genetic predisposition to stroke, blood pressure, body mass index, and alcohol use were strongly intercorrelated (rho >0.6; p<0.05 after Bonferroni correction for each comparison). Genetic risk imposed an independent effect of approximately 1-6% on mortality, DALYs and YLLs. The distribution pattern of stroke genetic predisposition is different at a macroscopic level, and it subtly but significantly impacts the epidemiological burden. Further research is warranted to identify the detailed aetiology and potential translation into public health measures. Beijing Municipal Science and Technology Commission (Z191100006619106), CAMS Innovation Fund for Medical Sciences (CAMS-I2M, 2023-I2M-1-001), the National High Level Hospital Clinical Research Funding (2022-GSP-GG-17), National Natural Science Foundation of China (32000398, 32171441 to X.J.), Natural Science Foundation of Guangdong Province, China (2017A030306026 to X.J.), and National Key R&D Program of China (2022YFC2502402).

The Current Situation, Problems and Countermeasures of High-Quality Economic and Social Development of Securities Companies Serving Districts and Counties

Districts and counties are the most basic units of administrative divisions in China. Therefore, the key to promoting high-quality economic and social development in China lies in promoting high-quality economic and social development in districts and counties. With the deepening of the “One Division One County” twinning assistance initiative, the role of securities companies in serving the high-quality economic and social development of districts and counties has become increasingly apparent. In order to better promote the high-quality economic and social development of securities companies serving districts and counties, this paper summarizes the main problems based on the analysis of the current situation of the high-quality economic and social development of securities companies serving districts and counties, and puts forward corresponding policy suggestions from the aspects of giving full play to the role of associations, building bridges serving districts and counties, giving full play to the professional advantages of securities companies, and creating characteristic comprehensive financial services.

A practice-based nursing emergency management system model for public health emergencies: A descriptive qualitative study.

This study aims to explore nursing emergency management system under public health emergencies. A descriptive qualitative study. Semi-structured interviews were conducted during March-November 2020 with 11 nursing emergency management administrators from 11 COVID-19 designated hospitals and infectious disease hospitals under four administrative divisions in China, who were recruited through convenience and purposive sampling. Interviews were audio-recorded and transcribed. Data were analysed with Braun and Clarke's inductive thematic analysis. The study adhered to the Consolidated Criteria for Reporting Qualitative Research. Three main themes emerged from data analysis: (1) Five core elements of nursing emergency management system: Structure, Staff, System, Setting, and Supply (5S); (2) Four phases of nursing emergency management system: Reduction, Readiness, Response and Recovery (4R); and (3) operational process of nursing emergency management system (5S*4R). The findings generated a conceptual model of a nursing emergency management system. This study provides a theoretical basis for nursing emergency management system for public health emergencies in the future. Nurse administrators could refer to this model to either review or develop their system and develop viable interventions to prepare for future public health emergencies.

Occurrence and Removal of Antibiotic Resistance in Nationwide Hospital Wastewater Deciphered by Metagenomics Approach - China, 2018-2022.

Hospital wastewater represents a significant conduit for the dissemination of antibiotic resistance genes (ARGs), including those that are of clinical importance. Yet, the variation in antibiotic resistance on a national level, which can be influenced by regional differences, has not been thoroughly elucidated. Uniform methodologies were employed to analyze data from various provincial-level administrative divisions in China, aiming to investigate the patterns of antibiotic resistance across these regions. This analysis illuminated the location preferences of clinically ARGs on plasmids. Additionally, our study uncovered regional variations in the presumed bacterial hosts of ARGs at the genus level. This investigation has shed light on the nationwide prevalence of ARGs in hospital wastewater in China, uncovering the significant ecological and public health risks associated with the disposal of such effluents.

Beyond green environments: Multi-scale difference in human exposure to greenspace in China.

Greenspace exposure metrics can allow for comparisons of green space supply across time, space, and population groups, and for inferring patterns of variation in opportunities for people to enjoy the health and recreational benefits of nearby green environments. A better understanding of greenspace exposure differences across various spatial scales is a critical requirement for lessening environmental health disparities. However, existing studies are typically limited to a single city or across selected cities, which severely limits the use of results in measuring systemic national and regional scale differences that might need policy at above individual city planning level. To close this knowledge gap, our study aims to provide a holistic assessment of multi-scale greenspace exposure across provinces, cities, counties, towns, and land parcels for the whole of China. We mapped the nationwide fractional greenspace coverage at 10m with Sentinel-2 satellite imagery, and then modeled population-weighted greenspace exposure to examine variation of greenspace exposure across scales. Our results show a prominent scaling effect of greenspace exposure across multi-scale administrative divisions in China, suggesting, as expected, an increase in heterogeneity with finer spatial scales. We also identify an asymmetric pattern of the difference between greenspace exposure and greenspace coverage, across a geo-demographic demarcation boundary (i.e., along the Heihe-Tengchong Line). In general, the greenspace coverage rate will overestimate more realistic human exposure to greenspace in East China while underestimating in West China. We further found that, in China, more recently urbanized areas have much better greenspace exposure than older urban areas. Our study provides a spatially explicit greenspace exposure metric for discovering multi-scale greenspace exposure difference, which will enhance governments' capacity to quantify environmental justice, detect vulnerable greenspace exposure risk hotspots, prioritize greenspace management at the supra-city scale, and monitor the balance between greenspace supply and demand.

CMDB: the comprehensive population genome variation database of China.

A high-quality genome variation database derived from a large-scale population is one of the most important infrastructures for genomics, clinical and translational medicine research. Here, we developed the Chinese Millionome Database (CMDB), a database that contains 9.04 million single nucleotide variants (SNV) with allele frequency information derived from low-coverage (0.06×-0.1×) whole-genome sequencing (WGS) data of 141 431 unrelated healthy Chinese individuals. These individuals were recruited from 31 out of the 34 administrative divisions in China, covering Han and 36 other ethnic minorities. CMDB, housing the WGS data of a multi-ethnic Chinese population featuring wide geographical distribution, has become the most representative and comprehensive Chinese population genome database to date. Researchers can quickly search for variant, gene or genomic regions to obtain the variant information, including mutation basic information, allele frequency, genic annotation and overview of frequencies in global populations. Furthermore, the CMDB also provides information on the association of the variants with a range of phenotypes, including height, BMI, maternal age and twin pregnancy. Based on these data, researchers can conduct meta-analysis of related phenotypes. CMDB is freely available at https://db.cngb.org/cmdb/.

Has the Reform of the Administrative Examination and Approval System Increased the Efficiency of Resource Allocation: Evidence from China

Based on data from the China Industry Business Performance Database from 1998 to 2007 and the time of establishment of the administrative examination and approval center in each administrative division in China, this study attempts to empirically determine the effects of the reform of the administrative examination and approval system on the efficiency of resource allocation from the perspectives of the degree of enterprise-level productivity dispersion. The empirical results showed that the reform of the administrative examination and approval system significantly reduced the degree of productivity dispersion among enterprises in an industry, in addition to enhancing the efficiency of resource allocation in the industry. A further analysis of heterogeneity revealed that the reform of the administrative examination and approval system yielded greater enhancements of the efficiency of resource allocation in industries with lower entry and exit rates.

Measuring the Efficiency of Fiscal Policies for Environmental Pollution Control and the Spatial Effect of Fiscal Decentralization in China.

This paper uses both fiscal expenditure policy and fiscal revenue policy as input indicators and selects environmental pollution control results reflecting different forms and sources of pollution as output indicators. The efficiency of fiscal policies for environmental pollution control (EFPE) of 30 provincial-level administrative divisions in China from 2007 to 2017 is measured by adopting the data envelopment analysis (DEA) method. Then, the spatial effect of fiscal decentralization on EFPE is empirically analyzed by using the spatial lag model (SLM). The results show that EFPE values in China have been greatly improved overall since 2014. The change in technical efficiency (TE) is caused mainly by the change in pure technical efficiency (PTE). EFPE values have regional heterogeneity and convergence. The eastern region has clearly higher EFPE values than other regions. The growth rate of the low efficient region is greater than that of the high efficient region. Fiscal expenditure decentralization has a direct negative effect and spatial spillover effect on EFPE values, while fiscal revenue decentralization has a non-significant effect. Based on these results, this paper proposes the following policy implications: increasing the level of fiscal expenditure of environmental pollution control and improving the central transfer payment system for environmental protection; reforming the government performance assessment system and innovating the conditions of government expenditure on environmental pollution control; and promoting horizontal fiscal cooperation in cross-regional environmental governance.

Evaluation of Privacy Risks of Patients' Data in China: Case Study.

BackgroundPatient privacy is a ubiquitous problem around the world. Many existing studies have demonstrated the potential privacy risks associated with sharing of biomedical data. Owing to the increasing need for data sharing and analysis, health care data privacy is drawing more attention. However, to better protect biomedical data privacy, it is essential to assess the privacy risk in the first place.ObjectiveIn China, there is no clear regulation for health systems to deidentify data. It is also not known whether a mechanism such as the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) safe harbor policy will achieve sufficient protection. This study aimed to conduct a pilot study using patient data from Chinese hospitals to understand and quantify the privacy risks of Chinese patients.MethodsWe used g-distinct analysis to evaluate the reidentification risks with regard to the HIPAA safe harbor approach when applied to Chinese patients’ data. More specifically, we estimated the risks based on the HIPAA safe harbor and limited dataset policies by assuming an attacker has background knowledge of the patient from the public domain.ResultsThe experiments were conducted on 0.83 million patients (with data field of date of birth, gender, and surrogate ZIP codes generated based on home address) across 33 provincial-level administrative divisions in China. Under the Limited Dataset policy, 19.58% (163,262/833,235) of the population could be uniquely identifiable under the g-distinct metric (ie, 1-distinct). In contrast, the Safe Harbor policy is able to significantly reduce privacy risk, where only 0.072% (601/833,235) of individuals are uniquely identifiable, and the majority of the population is 3000 indistinguishable (ie the population is expected to share common attributes with 3000 or less people).ConclusionsThrough the experiments based on real-world patient data, this work illustrates that the results of g-distinct analysis about Chinese patient privacy risk are similar to those from a previous US study, in which data from different organizations/regions might be vulnerable to different reidentification risks under different policies. This work provides reference to Chinese health care entities for estimating patients’ privacy risk during data sharing, which laid the foundation of privacy risk study about Chinese patients’ data in the future.

Sea Area Grading Methodology for Coastal County-level Administrative Division in China: A Case Study

Cai, Y.-Y., Zhang, Z.-P., Yan, J.-S., Gong, W., and Zhao, Q.-M., 2019. Sea area grading methodology for coastal county-level administrative division in China: A case study. In: Gong, D.; Zhu, H., and Liu, R. (eds.), Selected Topics in Coastal Research: Engineering, Industry, Economy, and Sustainable Development. Journal of Coastal Research, Special Issue No. 94, pp. 237–242. Coconut Creek (Florida), ISSN 0749-0208.Sea area grading of coastal county-level administrative division and sea area benchmark price formulation is a sea area use management work with Chinese characteristics. Sea area grading is the basis for formulating sea area benchmark price, and its essence is to perform suitability spatial differentiation evaluation for different sea uses. This study technical framework, and conducts an empirical research on the sea area grading for sea reclamation and structures in Zhuanghe City, Liaoning Province. The sea area grading range for sea reclamation and structures includes the marine functional zones except for the “marine protected areas”, “special utilization zones” and “reserved zones”. Six hundred sixty-three (663) 1 km×1 km sized grids are divided as the sea area grading units by the dynamic grid-based method. A sea area grading indicator system for sea reclamation and structures is established from three aspects: Sea area natural conditions, constraints of marine ecological spaces and sea area location conditions, The scores of the sea area grading units are calculated by the ArcGIS 10.2 software, and the sea area is divided into five grades. The final scheme is consistent with the sea area conditions in Zhuanghe City. About a half of the sea reclamation and non-permeable structures in Zhuanghe City are distributed in the grade 2 sea area, and the sea area benchmark price corresponding to the sea area grade will realize the value of the sea area resource assets to a greater extent.

Study on the Administrative Divisions in China’s Border Areas from the Perspective of Nation-state Building --- Changes to the Administrative Divisions in Inner Mongolia in the 20th Century

From the end of the Yuan Dynasty to the early Qing Dynasty, when Inner Mongolia was still a special administrative region of the Qing Empire, the Mongolian nomad's territory went through numerous significant changes. Since the beginning of the 20th century, the administrative divisions in Inner Mongolia underwent three major changes and after continuous integration they were incorporated into the administrative territory of the People's Republic of China in a manner that was compatible with the behavior of a modern nation-state. Such changes can neither be ascribed to the natural process of national development and it’s accompanying fissions nor to the sinocization of Inner Mongolian initiated by Han migrants. Instead, it is derived from the game of power played in the region by various forces, from the Manchu and Han peoples, to the Mongolians, Russians and Japanese, and the Kuomintang and the Chinese Communist Party in the period of surging modern nationalism. This is evidenced by the changes of division in Hulunbuir in particular. This case is enough to demonstrate that the issues of China’s border and nations are not simply equivalent to the binary opposition between Central Plains and border areas, between Han and ethnic minorities, but a process teeming with complex and diverse points of contention, political wrestling matches and other interactions.

コメント 「国内」と「境外」のあいだ―中国の夢と中国による悪夢

コメント 「国内」と「境外」のあいだ―中国の夢と中国による悪夢

Administrative Boundary Changes and Regional Inequality in Provincial China

Although many studies have been conducted on regional inequality, no consistent findings can be produced in terms of the temporal trends and mechanisms underlying regional inequality until now. It is widely acknowledged that the utilization of different data sources, time periods and methodologies gives rise to different measurements of regional inequality. This study aims to shed new light on this issue from the perspective of administrative boundary changes in China. Since the reform and open-door policy in 1978, administrative divisions in China have frequently been adjusted as part of a strategy of the State to promote rapid economic development. This strategy poses a great challenge to the study of temporal trends as well as the causal mechanisms for regional inequality, which has been rarely studied. Taking the Chinese province of Guangdong as an example, this paper adopts a multi-scale decomposition method to demonstrate that administrative boundary changes have a significant impact on the measurement of regional inequality. By excluding administrative boundary changes, previous studies often portrayed a misleading picture of the divergence or convergence of regional inequality. Drawing on a multi-scale and multi-mechanism framework, this paper employs a spatial regression model to investigate the impact of administrative boundary changes on extracting mechanisms of regional inequality. On the one hand, administrative restructuring alters the intensity of spatial dependence of regional development. On the other hand, different combinations of significant driving factors vary under different administrative divisions. Therefore, the consideration of administrative boundary changes would enhance a fuller understanding of regional inequality in China.

Rejection of insulin therapy among patients with type 2 diabetes in China: reasons and recommendations

Background Insulin injection therapy is one of the most effective treatments for type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). Many people with T2DM in western countries resist starting insulin therapy; whether the same is true in China is unknown. This survey-based study assessed acceptance and rejection of insulin therapy among individuals with T2DM in China and self-reported reasons for these therapy choices. It also examined what methods may be useful for increasing the rate of insulin acceptance. Methods A multi-center, cross-sectional survey was conducted between April and July 2010 to a convenience sample of inpatients and outpatients at 50 medical centers across 29 administrative divisions in China. Data were collected on sociodemographic and T2DM characteristics, therapy regime, and attitudes toward insulin therapy. Results A total of 6 043 patients were surveyed, and 5 961 complete questionnaires (98.6%) were used in the analysis. Just over half the respondents (3 460, 58.0%) reported negative attitudes to insulin therapy, including 2 508 of the 4 469 patients (56.1%) whose physicians had recommended it to them. Of the patients counseled to use insulin, 800 (17.9%) were unwilling to start therapy and cited the following reasons: inconvenience (64.3%); concerns over addiction (24.6%); pain (14.3%); side effects (14.1%); and high cost (13.6%). Logistic regression suggested that respondents would be more willing to undertake insulin therapy if they had received diabetes education, had positive attitudes to the treatment, had higher glycosylated hemoglobin level, or had suffered diabetes for a longer period or with more complications. Conclusions Patients with T2DM in China are often resistant to insulin therapy if they have been diagnosed with the disease for a relatively short time or if the disease has been relatively mild. Educating patients on the benefits of insulin therapy, not only at the initial diagnosis with T2DM but also when insulin therapy becomes necessary, will likely increase their willingness to undertake it.

Cultural border, administrative border, and regional economic development: Evidence from Chinese cities

Current province-level administrative division in China breaks the distribution of local culture and many cities are separated from their respective local culture regions to locate in other provinces. These cities encounter potential cultural conflicts with the mainstream culture of the provinces they belong to, but also face various local protectionism barriers with cities in the neighboring province that share the same border and local culture with them. As a result, transaction costs could be higher whichever side they trade with, leading to potential harm to their economic development. Using dialect as a proxy for local culture, we find that the cultural segmentation caused by the misalignment between cultural and administrative borders can significantly hamper economic development of the segmented cities. This negative effect is aggravated by greater local protectionism in neighboring provinces but alleviated by a longer history of being administrated by the same province with the current provincial capital. These findings support the hypothesis that cultural and administrative border misalignment works together with local protectionism to bring about substantial economic loss. The results thus highlight the importance of both formal and informal institutions in affecting transaction costs and economic growth, and also shed light on the potential interactions between the two types of institutions.

Distribution and determinants of non communicable diseases among elderly Uyghur ethnic group in Xinjiang, China.

BackgroundNon-communicable diseases (NCDs) are showing an increasing trend globally as well as in China. Elderly population are more prone to these NCDs. Situation in China is worse owing to the higher proportion of geriatric population. Burden of NCDs and the role of their socio-demographic and behavioral predictors among these elderly and more so among the ethnic minority groups among them, need to be investigated specifically, owing to their distinct genetic background, lifestyles and behavior.MethodsA cross-sectional study was conducted among 1329 randomly selected persons of Uyghur ethnicity, aged 60 years or more in Xinjiang, the largest administrative division in China to measure the burden of NCDs, understand the distribution of socio-demographic, behavioral and life event-related potential correlates of them and to estimate the association of the NCDs with these correlates.ResultsAmong these participants 54.2% were female, 86.8% were married and more than half had only attended elementary school or less. 41.46% was suffering from at least one NCD. 20.22% had one NCD, 12.11% had two and 8.58% had three or more. 27.3% had hypertension, 4.06% had diabetes, 6.02% had hyperlipidemia, 7.37% had angina, 14.52% had cardiovascular diseases, 11.59% had any kind of cancers and 9.78% had chronic obstructive pulmonary diseases. Rural residents (OR = 1.45, 95% CI: 1.17–1.80, AOR = 2.00, 95% CI: 1.53–2.61) and current smokers had higher odds of having more NCDs (AOR = 1.53, 95% CI: 1.00–2.34). Additionally not being satisfied with current life, not being able to take care of self in daily life, currently not being involved in farm work, less intake of fresh vegetables, fruits and garlic, too less or too much salt intake, not having hobbies were found to be positively associated with having more NCDs.ConclusionImplementation of effective intervention strategies to promote healthy life styles among the Uyghur elderly population of China seems urgent.