Public Gatherings Research Articles

A longitudinal study of mass loads of quaternary ammonium compounds in sludge associated with COVID-19 Stringency Index indicators in Beijing, China

This study estimated population normalized mass loads (PNML) of quaternary ammonium compounds (QACs) including alkyltrimethylammonium chloride (ATMAC), benzylalkyldimethylammonium chloride (BAC), and dialkyldimethylammonium chloride (DADMAC) and assessed their associations with COVID-19 containment policies. We collected daily sludge specimens from five wastewater treatment plants in Beijing from July 2020 to May 2022. Using liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry, we determined QAC concentrations and backward-estimated their PNML. We used COVID-19 Oxford Stringency Index and its metrics to measure containment policies. We analysed the relationship between QACs and containment measures using linear regression models. Among QACs categories, ΣBAC had median PNML of 94.54 μg/person/day, ΣDADMAC had 282.36 μg/person/day, and ΣATMAC had 802.55 μg/person/day. The ΣQACs median PNML was 1186.12 μg/person/day. The PNML of QACs appeared to have general increasing trend over time and were significantly different across seasons. PNML increased on average by 11 μg/person/day (95 % CI: 3.2, 19) for ΣBAC per 10-unit increase in Stringency Index score. Notably, higher stringency levels in three index indicators — workplace closures, internal movement restrictions, and public gathering restriction were positively associated with higher ΣQACs PNML. Sludge derived QACs may reflect the magnitude of disinfectant use at different stages of pandemic control response.

Segmenting hotspots from medical thermal images using Density-based modified FC-Pc FS with spatial information

ABSTRACT Thermal cameras complemented with robust and automated computational intelligence-aided diagnostic systems can be deployed at public gathering points and on smartphones to raise alarms about thriving diseases of their body due to inflammation in a timely manner, thereby strengthening human health systems. In this work, we have proposed two robust Density-based modified Picture Fuzzy Clustering methods with spatial information to segment hotspots from human’s abnormal thermal images. We formulated and solved the objective function by combining P c FS-based clustering method with modified Renyi’s Entropy. We demonstrated the robustness of our methods, DSIFC-Pc FS and DSIMFC-Pc FS, on three publicly available datasets and an artificially created noisy dataset of thermal images. We have obtained a ZC score of 0.933, 0.947 and 0.933 for DB-DMR-IR, DB-FOOT-IR and DB-THY-IR datasets, respectively. Also, our method converged to an optimal partition matrix in minimum iterations. The experimental performance shows that the proposed approaches, DSIFC- P c FS and DSIMFC- P c FS, outperformed other ten related approaches in segmenting the medical thermal images with and without noise, indicating their robustness and efficacy, in terms of various unsupervised evaluation metrics. Also, we statistically analysed their performance in contrast to other methods using the Friedman Test, which advocate their superiority.

A place of encounter: Health and social care workers’ perspectives on public gathering spaces for people using drugs

Background: The use of drugs is an escalating concern, with significant implications for the health and daily functionality for individuals. It has proven challenging to provide accessible health and social services. In the context of addressing substance use issues in urban areas, public gathering places for individuals who use drugs play a multifaceted role, serving as sites of belonging, support and potential illicit activity. This qualitative study explores the experiences of healthcare and social workers regarding a public gathering place, referred to as “the Bench”, in a medium-sized Norwegian city. Methods: A qualitative research design consisting of semi-structured focus group interviews and individual interviews with 13 participants representing various support agencies. Results: The analysis resulted in four thematic areas: (1) belonging and a gateway to support and services; (2) balancing user autonomy at the Bench and systems support; (3) the role of a centralised location; and (4) the preventive role of support workers at the Bench. Conclusion: While the Bench fosters a sense of community and provides access to vital services, concerns about illicit activities persist due to its visibility. Nevertheless, its central location facilitates outreach efforts and ensures easy access to support services. The study underscores the preventive role of healthcare and social workers in stabilising the environment and mitigating conflicts. Furthermore, it highlights the importance of central locations for public gathering places, emphasising the proximity to low-threshold services. The Bench represents a crucial venue for establishing relationships and providing assistance to individuals who use drugs, contributing to harm reduction efforts in the community.

Prevalence of multidrug-resistant enteropathogenic Escherichia coli (EPEC) in river Gomti at Jaunpur city

The present study investigated the microbial EPEC load exhibiting three distinct marker genes: eaeA, bfp, and stx1 in the river Gomati water across Jaunpur City, India. In order to determine the prevalence of EPEC virulent strains that are multidrug-resistant, eight different public gathering sites on the river were selected from upstream to downstream flow. The highest population of total coliform (5400×103) and fecal coliforms (3500×107) were subsequently recorded from site #5 (Gopi ghat). A total of 46 EPEC strains were virulent, exhibiting eaeA and bfp genes, while none of them harbored the stx1 gene. All 46 strains contained the eaeA gene (100%); however, only 11 isolates, as 24.10%, exhibited bfp virulent genes. Most of the EPEC isolates from all seasons were resistant to more than three different classes of variable drugs and confirmed multidrug resistance. The highest 95.7% of total isolates (44) exhibited resistance against tetracycline, while the lowest four isolates (8.6%) against ciprofloxacin. Furthermore, it was evident that the bacterial population load and a load of virulent genes were found to be higher in the samples of the city's significant sites. This confirms the large-scale fecal contamination of water either through nearby animals or anthropogenic activities, which are needed to make proper management.

On the cult of the individual: The Quantified Self public gatherings, self-tracking, and individualism

The article explores the relationship between individualism and group affiliation in the context of self-tracking technology. Prior research establishes that self-tracking fosters both self-focus and collective interactions. The article proposes that Durkheim’s notion of the cult of the individual offers a lens to understand the interplay of individualism and group formation in self-tracking. The notion of the cult of the individual suggests that individualism can be a source of public gatherings. While Durkheim’s notion remained largely untested for over a century, this study aims to build upon Durkheim’s framework by operationalizing it using Collins’s interaction ritual theory. By operationalizing the cult of the individual as a specific form of interaction ritual, we can analyze the collective mechanisms at play within the Quantified Self movement. This group organizes a community of self-trackers who share personal data during public gatherings. The article explores these public gatherings by deciphering their video recordings. Quantified Self-individualist gatherings are constituted by the co-presence of self-focused people, presenting one after the other their personal data following a script, and defending individuals against profaning situations. Quantified Self gatherings formed a transnational interaction ritual chain in approximately 71 cities on four continents, confirming that individualist gatherings can achieve a wide diffusion. Therefore, this original operationalization of Durkheim’s notion of the cult of the individual illustrates its enduring relevance and potential for broader application.

Dr. Anandibai Joshi: An Indian Medical Pioneer.

Dr. Anandibai Joshi was the first Indian female physician to complete her studies in Western medicine at the Women's Medical College of Pennsylvania. A pioneer in medicine, she was a trailblazing Indian woman, who had faced many hurdles during her quest for education. In her short span of life, she faced a lot of emotional, mental, physical, and social turbulence and had to prove herself at every step to the orthodox patriarchal Indian society the need to study medicine. Studying medicine in India was impossible for females during the 19th century. During those days, the females in India were uneducated due to gender differences prevalent in society, so the only option was to pursue medicine in a foreign land. Her life was full of hardships and challenges; she got married at the age of nine and, at the young age of 14, delivered a baby boy who could not survive beyond 10 days due to lack of medical care. This was the turning point in her life, and she was determined to become a physician so that the other women would not suffer the way she had. Thus began her educational journey, to pursue a career in Western medicine. Before Anandibai went to the United States, she gave a motivating speech in a public gathering, expressing the need for female doctors in India and her keenness to pursue medicine in the United States. She challenged all the social norms in those days, whether it was fighting to break gender stereotypes or convincing the male-dominated society to study medicine in the United States. This article is a reflection of Anandibai's accomplishments in her life and medical career and her dedication, determination, and strong commitment to improving the lives of Indian women. Her short life is a reflection of hope, perseverance, determination, and success and an inspiration to many Indian women to pursue education and medicine.

20-Year trends in the social participation of the oldest old.

To investigate 20-year trends in social participation among the oldest old (77+ years) in Sweden and assess the extent to which changes in educational attainment and functional abilities explain these trends. Seven waves of the Swedish Panel Study of Living Conditions of the Oldest Old (SWEOLD) spanning 2002-2021 were used with a repeated cross-sectional design. To analyse the association between time and social participation we employed the Karlson-Holm-Breen method of decomposition. The study focused on informal social participation (contact with friends and family), leisure participation (public or semi-public gatherings), and formal participation (organisational engagement and study circle attendance). Both leisure and informal participation peaked in 2014 and declined in 2021, influenced by the COVID-19 pandemic, whereas formal participation showed a slight increase in 2021. Total participation increased at least until 2011. Overall, older adults have increased their levels of social participation in recent decades, disregarding the influence of the pandemic. Decomposition analysis revealed that population-level changes in educational attainment and functional abilities explained a substantial portion of the observed trends. As the proportion of older adults continues to rise, it becomes increasingly important to understand the developments and drivers of behavioural change in the older population. As more people are socially active, there may be increasing differences between those participating and those not - which could lead to increased inequalities. The observed trend in increasing participation, influenced by changes in education and health, emphasises the importance of fostering age-friendly environments and addressing potential social inequalities among older adults.

Agent-based simulation of non-urgent egress from mass events in open public spaces

Public mass events require thorough planning on allocating resources such as paramedics, police officers, urban cleaning teams, and their equipment (ambulances, patrol cars, garbage collection trucks, and other urban cleaning vehicles). Testing different scenarios of event venue layout and crowd behavior at the end of an event might be useful to plan the event and said resource allocation.Our main objective is to model the non-urgent egress of participants at the end of an event, with possible applications for event management. That is when some resources are released (police and paramedics) and others are requested (urban cleaning teams).Using the agent-based GAMA platform, we implemented a spatially explicit simulation model upon an extension of the Social Force Model that considers group behavior, and a novel implementation of the “social retention” phenomenon, to simulate non-urgent egress from public space mass gathering events. Focus groups with architecture, geography, and urban ergonomics experts were conducted for face validation and improvement of the model.We present the outcome of a series of simulations of a scenario mimicking a real-life music event that took place in a square in downtown Lisbon, Portugal. Cell phone data captured during the event was used to calibrate the model. We analyzed model performance when the number of pedestrian agents increases, to assess the feasibility of using our approach in participatory discussions with stakeholders responsible for resources management.On average, the egress evolution obtained in the simulations fit well with the evolution of cell phone counts captured during the event. The behavior of groups of agents evidenced real-life phenomena, such as the persistence of group cohesion and repulsion interactions (both with architectural obstacles and other agents).Model performance degradation with the increasing number of agents may hamper the usage of this model/platform for participatory meetings, due to the incurred delay in obtaining results. To mitigate this problem, we plan to explore parallelization strategies for agent-based simulation, such as using GPUs.

Developing church leaders in Kenya for transformative leadership: Lessons from the Covid-19 pandemic

The Covid-19 pandemic presented the world with a new, unanticipated challenge, more scandalous than we had experienced before. For the first time in history, the world encountered the collapse of socio-religious, political, and economic structures. The closure of learning institutions, the transport sector, public gatherings, economic hubs, worship centres, and so on proved to be more hazardous than what had previously been experienced. In Kenya, the church leaders remained helpless and powerless as people, including Christians, lost their lives, businesses closed down, institutions collapsed, the socio-religious and political web crumbled. Poverty encroached into every sector of the society. The question we need is, ‘Are church leaders in Kenya and Africa a whole well-equipped to meet unanticipated emerging challenges as Covid-19 was? This study investigated whether church leaders in Kenya receive holistic training to enable them handle every situation that may come among Christians at any time. Are church leaders trained to become transformative leaders who can help their followers amidst disconcerting challenges such as Covid-19? Investigations were made at some selected universities and theological colleges in Kenya where church leaders are trained to find out whether the leadership training they receive in helps them become transformative leaders. To achieve this, the curricular of some purposely selected universities including St. Paul's University, Catholic University in East Africa, KAG-EAST University, Africa International University, Kenya Methodist University and the Presbyterian University of East Africa. 100 respondents including 50 priests/ministers/ and 50 ordinary Christians drawn from various Churches in Kenya, provided information that was used in the compilation of this article. Although the Church has remained one the main agents of change in the world over the centuries, in Kenya she has failed to offer the urgently needed socio-economic, religious and political transformation. This can largely be attributed to the church leaders' lack of transformational leadership skills. The article suggests that the intuitions where church leaders in Kenya and the rest of Africa are prepared and the in-service training should prepare them to become transformational leaders.

A hidden form of mass event: the law, politics, and practice of single pickets in Russia

ABSTRACT Single picketing, in which an individual stands in public holding a sign, emerged as a new form of protest in Russia in recent years under the context of increased political repression, and is the last form of protest that does not require prior authorization from authorities. In this article, I develop an understanding of single pickets by examining the evolving dynamics between the state and protestors. I argue that the current practice of single pickets developed as the result of increasingly harsh legal restrictions on public gatherings, and while the Russian state seeks to manage public political action through legal means, protesters continuously find ways to work around or exploit loopholes in the law, in turn shaping new forms of legality in daily life. My analysis is based on tracing the evolution of the laws governing single pickets and online ethnography I conducted during 2020–2021.

Appraisal of policy measures at the beginning of a pandemic: Empirical evidence from the first four months and 12 months of the COVID-19 pandemic

PurposeThe rapid spread of the COVID-19 pandemic upended societies across the world, with billions forced into lockdowns. As countries contemplated instating and rolling back lockdown measures, and considered the impact of pandemic fatigue on policy measures, and furthermore to prepare for the improved management of future pandemics, this study examines the effectiveness of policy measures in limiting the spread of infections and fatalities.Design/methodology/approachThe methodological approach in the study centres on a fixed effects panel regression analysis and employs the COVID-19 Government Response Stringency Index, which comprises eight containment measures and three health campaigns, with progressive degrees of stringency, in order to investigate the efficacy of government policies.FindingsFindings suggest that some government policies were effective at reducing implicit mortality rates, infection cases and fatalities during the first four months of the COVID-19 pandemic. Solid stringency measures to reduce mortality rates include public gathering restrictions on more than 100 attendees, and international travel limits for developed countries and islands. Fatalities can further be reduced through the closing of public transport, whereas infection cases also experience benefits from public information campaigns. Comparable results are observed in a robustness test across 12 months.Originality/valueSome non-pharmaceutical policies are shown to be more effective than others at reducing the spread of infections, fatalities and mortality rates, and support policymakers to manage future pandemics more effectively.

Police reforms in India: A Human Rights Concern

Abstract The police, an integral component of the justice system, are primarily tasked with maintaining law and order, particularly through the enforcement of criminal codes. According to the Royal Commission on Police Powers and Procedures in 1929, a policeman is an individual employed by the state to perform duties that, if desired, could have been undertaken voluntarily. Today, the term “police” refers to the civil executive force of a state entrusted with maintaining public order and enforcing regulations for crime prevention and apprehension. In contemporary times, the role of the police extends beyond crime prevention and detection to encompass various welfare activities such as assisting in traffic management, crowd control at public gatherings, aiding fire brigades and flood rescue operations, and resolving minor disputes among the public. However, this paper does not solely focus on the definition of the police. Instead, it provides an overview of police reforms in India, highlighting the challenges faced by the Indian police system and proposing solutions to address these challenges. Additionally, it explores the legal standpoint on police reforms. Keyword– Indian Police, Public Order, Royal Commission, Criminal Codes, Traffic Management

Synthesizing Jakarta City’s Local Wisdom: Reimagining Sidewalks with an Emotional Design and Sustainability Approach

The research objective was to design sidewalks as walking facilities and public spaces, considering comfort, safety, cleanliness, and functionality for Jakarta’s residents. The city of Jakarta, as a megapolitan center, hosted various societal activities. The high mobility of Jakarta’s population led to busy sidewalk activities, especially walking, regulated by the Director General of Highways’ guidelines. Walking could help reduce pollution, with Jakarta having the worst pollution in 2023. The research problem, based on 360-degree Google Maps images of sidewalks, was that sidewalks serve not only as footpaths but also as public gathering spaces. The qualitative research method examined digital data on sidewalk use in Jakarta (west, central, south, east, and north). The design process incorporated emotional design (visceral, behavioral, reflective) and three dimensions of sustainability (The Overlapping Spheres Model of Triple Bottom Line/TBL). The result is a 3D sidewalk model using emotional and sustainability design approaches. Synthesis of emotional design interprets visceral (sensory), behavioral (habits), and reflective (values) levels. Synthesis of sustainability includes environmental, social, and economic dimensions, focusing on air quality, water management, and energy efficiency. Social and economic aspects aim to meet Jakarta residents’ basic needs. Ultimately, these recommendations aim to make cities and neighborhoods inclusive, safe, resilient, and sustainable. However, the research is limited to design recommendations without direct implementation. Further research or implementation is needed to address these challenges and ensure Jakarta residents’ future well-being.

Influence of Nurses' Perceptions of Government Policies and COVID-19 Risks on Their Mental Health Status: A Web-Based Cross-Sectional Study.

This study aimed to understand nurses' perceptions of COVID-19-related policies and risks during the outbreak of COVID-19 in Hong Kong and to determine how their perceptions influenced their mental health status. A web-based online survey among Hong Kong nurses was conducted. The questionnaire included a self-designed 5-point Likert scale with 17 items to assess the nurses' perceptions of COVID-19-related policies and risks, as well as the Davidson Trauma Scale (DTS), the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS), the Patient Health Questionnaire-2 (PHQ-2) and the Generalised Anxiety Disorder scale (GAD) for measurement of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), stress, depression and anxiety, respectively. Of 592 nurses enrolled, 30.6% had PTSD (DTS total score ≥40), and 80.4%, 19.9% and 16.4% had moderate-to-high levels of stress (PSS-10 score ≥14), depression (PHQ-2 score ≥3) and anxiety (GAD score ≥3), respectively. The top three concerned aspects were 'worried about themselves and friends to suffer this disease' (84.5%), 'insufficient number of isolation wards' (81.8%) and 'insufficient number of personal protective equipment' (74.3%). Logistic regression analyses showed that more negative perception on 'personal protective equipment in the healthcare institutions', 'the confidence in HK's control of COVID-19', 'worried about themselves and friends to suffer this disease' and 'self-perceived risk of infection' indicated higher severity of the four mental health problems (all p < 0.01). The perception on 'public gathering ban', 'the number of isolation wards' and 'expected time to control COVID-19' were significantly associated with PTSD and stress (all p < 0.05). Nurses' perception on government policies and COVID-19 risks played an important role in predicting their mental health status. Policy makers should be aware of nurses' psychological responses and provide timely and targeted emotional support to nurses amid and after the COVID-19 pandemic.

Real-Time Face Mask Detection Using MobileNet V2

Abstract: The rapid disruption of international trade and travel caused by the COVID-19 epidemic has had an impact on our daily lives. The custom of donning a face mask for protection has evolved. In the near future, a lot of public service providers will demand that clients wear appropriate masks in order to use their services. Identification of face masks is becoming a crucial duty to support world culture. This paper outlines a condensed method for accomplishing this goal utilizing certain fundamental machine learning tools, such as TensorFlow, Keras, OpenCV, and Scikit-Learn. The project's goal is to identify face masks at a public event or gathering. MobileNet V2 is the algorithm employed in the project to accomplish the goal. There is a picture of a few people with and without masks. As an input dataset, a picture of a few individuals wearing and not wearing masks is employed. Pre- processing, data augmentation, training, testing, and image segmentation are some of the steps that go into reaching the project's goal. Creating a model that can identify people who are not wearing masks in public settings is the goal of this project. To guarantee adherence to the standards for public safety, this work can be combined with real-time applications at airports, train stations, businesses,schools, and other public locations.

Community-Centric Approach: Bhabinkamtibmas Strategies in Mitigating Covid-19 Transmission Within The Cultural Landscape Of Hukurila

The escalation of Covid-19 in Indonesia, including Maluku, underscores varying levels of public awareness concerning health protocols, notably non-compliance with mask-wearing, public gatherings, and other breaches of Covid-19 regulations. This article delves into the pivotal role of Bhabinkamtibmas, an integral part of the police force, in addressing these community issues. The research aims to elucidate Bhabinkamtibmas' strategies in curtailing the virus's spread in the indigenous community of Negeri Hukurila, employing a community-centric approach with qualitative methods like in-depth interviews, observations, and document studies. Research findings highlight Bhabinkamtibmas' active participation in health education, mask distribution, and vaccination programs. They are also integral to the 3T strategy, establishing health centres, innovating health protocols in restaurants, fortifying places of worship, conducting vaccinations, implementing colour zoning, and forming Covid-19 data task forces. Bhabinkamtibmas goes beyond education, fostering security and discipline in the community's adherence to health protocols during the pandemic. Collaborating with Babinsa, they actively curb virus spread through socializing health protocols, participating in evacuations, and overseeing quarantine measures. Despite distinct roles, Bhabinkamtibmas and Babinsa maintain synergy, underscoring the need for community involvement and cross-institutional collaboration for optimal Covid-19 management.

A novel multi-scale violence and public gathering dataset for crowd behavior classification

Dependable utilization of computer vision applications, such as smart surveillance, requires training deep learning networks on datasets that sufficiently represent the classes of interest. However, the bottleneck in many computer vision applications lies in the limited availability of adequate datasets. One particular application that is of great importance for the safety of cities and crowded areas is smart surveillance. Conventional surveillance methods are reactive and often ineffective in enable real-time action. However, smart surveillance is a key component of smart and proactive security in a smart city. Motivated by a smart city application which aims at the automatic identification of concerning events for alerting law-enforcement and governmental agencies, we craft a large video dataset that focuses on the distinction between small-scale violence, large-scale violence, peaceful gatherings, and natural events. This dataset classifies public events along two axes, the size of the crowd observed and the level of perceived violence in the crowd. We name this newly-built dataset the Multi-Scale Violence and Public Gathering (MSV-PG) dataset. The videos in the dataset go through several pre-processing steps to prepare them to be fed into a deep learning architecture. We conduct several experiments on the MSV-PG datasets using a ResNet3D, a Swin Transformer and an R(2 + 1)D architecture. The results achieved by these models when trained on the MSV-PG dataset, 88.37%, 89.76%, and 89.3%, respectively, indicate that the dataset is well-labeled and is rich enough to train deep learning models for automatic smart surveillance for diverse scenarios.

Exploring behavioral intention to use telemedicine services post COVID-19: a cross sectional study in Saudi Arabia.

While telemedicine offers significant benefits, there remain substantial knowledge gaps in the literature, particularly regarding its use in Saudi Arabia. This study aims to explore health consumers' behavioral intention to use telemedicine examining the associated factors such as eHealth literacy and attitudes toward telemedicine services. A cross-sectional observational study was conducted to collect data on demographics, health status, internet skills, attitudes toward telemedicine, and eHealth literacy. An online survey was administered at two large public gatherings in Riyadh. The eHEALS-Pl scale was used to measure perceived eHealth literacy levels, and data analysis was performed using SPSS (IBM Corp. United States). There were 385 participants, with an equal distribution of genders. The largest age group was 18-20 years old (57%). Nearly half of the participants were neither employed nor students, while 43% had access to governmental hospitals through employment. 71% reported proficiency in using the internet. Health-wise, 47% rated their health as excellent, and 56% did not have medical insurance. 87% expressed a high likelihood of using telemedicine if offered by a provider. Participants were categorized based on their eHealth Literacy scores, with 54% scoring low and 46% scoring high. Overall, participants showed positive attitudes toward telemedicine, with 82% agreeing that it saves time, money, and provides access to specialized care. About half of the participants perceived the process of seeing a doctor through telemedicine video as complex. Both eHealth Literacy and attitudes toward telemedicine showed a statistically significant association with the intention to use telemedicine (p < 0.001). There was a positive and significant correlation between eHealth Literacy and attitudes (ρ =0.460; p < 0.001). Multivariate ordinal regression analysis revealed that the odds for a high likelihood of intention to use telemedicine significantly increased with positive attitudes (p < 0.001). Mediation analysis confirmed the significant mediating role of attitudes toward telemedicine in the relationship between eHealth Literacy and the intention to use telemedicine. The findings underline the importance of enhancing health literacy and consumer attitudes toward telemedicine, particularly during the healthcare digital transformation we are experiencing globally. This is crucial for promoting increased acceptance and utilization of telemedicine services beyond the COVID-19 pandemic.

A rigorous theoretical and numerical analysis of a nonlinear reaction-diffusion epidemic model pertaining dynamics of COVID-19

The spatial movement of the human population from one region to another and the existence of super-spreaders are the main factors that enhanced the disease incidence. Super-spreaders refer to the individuals having transmitting ability to multiple pathogens. In this article, an epidemic model with spatial and temporal effects is formulated to analyze the impact of some preventing measures of COVID-19. The model is developed using six nonlinear partial differential equations. The infectious individuals are sub-divided into symptomatic, asymptomatic and super-spreader classes. In this study, we focused on the rigorous qualitative analysis of the reaction-diffusion model. The fundamental mathematical properties of the proposed COVID-19 epidemic model such as boundedness, positivity, and invariant region of the problem solution are derived, which ensure the validity of the proposed model. The model equilibria and its stability analysis for both local and global cases have been presented. The normalized sensitivity analysis of the model is carried out in order to observe the crucial factors in the transmission of infection. Furthermore, an efficient numerical scheme is applied to solve the proposed model and detailed simulation are performed. Based on the graphical observation, diffusion in the context of confined public gatherings is observed to significantly inhibit the spread of infection when compared to the absence of diffusion. This is especially important in scenarios where super-spreaders may play a major role in transmission. The impact of some non-pharmaceutical interventions are illustrated graphically with and without diffusion. We believe that the present investigation will be beneficial in understanding the complex dynamics and control of COVID-19 under various non-pharmaceutical interventions.

IJCM_307A: Perception and practice of Nipah among first year undergraduate medical students of knct medical college

Background: Nipah infection is a zoonotic disease caused by Nipah virus with a very high case fatality rate (40-75%). The current outbreak (12-15 September 2023) was the third Nipah virus outbreak in Kozhikode district of Kerala, and overall the fourth outbreak in Kerala state since 2018. The state government had declared containment zones in the district and there was restriction of movement, public gatherings; wearing of masks and social distancing was mandatory in public spaces. The educational institutions including professional colleges were closed as a precautionary measure and switched to online classes. In this context, this study was conducted among the first-year medical students of KMCT medical college Objective: To assess the Perception and Practice about Nipah among first year undergraduate medical students of KMCT medical college Methodology: A cross sectional study was done among 2023 batch students of KMCT medical college students from September 18th to October 28, 2023. All the 150 students were taken by universal sampling for the study, out of which 144 were present at the time of data collection. Data was collected by investigators using a semi-structured questionnaire consisting of knowledge, attitude and practice-based sections. Scoring was done. The data was analyzed and recorded as frequencies and percentage. Results: Majority of the students (69%) had poor knowledge on Nipah, 29% had satisfactory knowledge and 2% of the students had very good knowledge. Majority of the students (89%) had good attitude towards Nipah while 10% had poor attitude. 68% students were found to have followed excellent practices, 30% had followed satisfactory practices while 2% had not practiced any good etiquette needed during an outbreak. Conclusion: Though they were having poor knowledge about Nipah, they followed good practices that helped in preventing and controlling the disease.