Fear Of Spread Research Articles

Estimating the Effect of State-Level Stay-at-Home Orders

As fear of COVID-19 spread in early 2020, individuals began reducing their activity outside the home and governments adopted policies to slow the spread. With this in mind, I estimate the average effect of state-level stay-at-home orders on Google Mobility data while controlling for changes in the perceived risk of the pandemic over time. In general, I find that state-level stay-at-home orders appear to account for little of the observed change in activity.

The Impact of Social Media on Panic During the COVID-19 Pandemic in Iraqi Kurdistan: Online Questionnaire Study

BackgroundIn the first few months of 2020, information and news reports about the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) were rapidly published and shared on social media and social networking sites. While the field of infodemiology has studied information patterns on the Web and in social media for at least 18 years, the COVID-19 pandemic has been referred to as the first social media infodemic. However, there is limited evidence about whether and how the social media infodemic has spread panic and affected the mental health of social media users.ObjectiveThe aim of this study is to determine how social media affects self-reported mental health and the spread of panic about COVID-19 in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq.MethodsTo carry out this study, an online questionnaire was prepared and conducted in Iraqi Kurdistan, and a total of 516 social media users were sampled. This study deployed a content analysis method for data analysis. Correspondingly, data were analyzed using SPSS software.ResultsParticipants reported that social media has a significant impact on spreading fear and panic related to the COVID-19 outbreak in Iraqi Kurdistan, with a potential negative influence on people’s mental health and psychological well-being. Facebook was the most used social media network for spreading panic about the COVID-19 outbreak in Iraq. We found a significant positive statistical correlation between self-reported social media use and the spread of panic related to COVID-19 (R=.8701). Our results showed that the majority of youths aged 18-35 years are facing psychological anxiety.ConclusionsDuring lockdown, people are using social media platforms to gain information about COVID-19. The nature of the impact of social media panic among people varies depending on an individual's gender, age, and level of education. Social media has played a key role in spreading anxiety about the COVID-19 outbreak in Iraqi Kurdistan.

PTSD as the second tsunami of the SARS-Cov-2 pandemic.

Since the first cases, the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) rapidly spread around the world, with hundred-thousand cases and thousands of deaths. Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a common consequence of major disasters. Exceptional epidemic situations also promoted PTSD in the past. Considering that humanity is undergoing the most severe pandemic since Spanish Influenza, the actual pandemic of COVID-19 is very likely to promote PTSD. Moreover, COVID-19 was renamed severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-Cov-2). With a poor understanding of viruses and spreading mechanisms, the evocation of SARS is generating a great anxiety contributing to promote PTSD. Quarantine of infected patients evolved to quarantine of 'infected' towns or popular districts, and then of entire countries. In the families of cases, the brutal death of family members involved a spread of fear and a loss of certainty, promoting PTSD. In the context of disaster medicine with a lack of human and technical resources, healthcare workers could also develop acute stress disorders, potentially degenerating into chronic PTSD. Globally, WHO estimates 30-50% of the population affected by a disaster suffered from diverse psychological distress. PTSD individuals are more at-risk of suicidal ideation, suicide attempt, and deaths by suicide - considering that healthcare workers are already at-risk occupations. We draw attention towards PTSD as a secondary effect of the SARS-Cov-2 pandemic, both for general population, patients, and healthcare workers. Healthcare policies need to take into account preventive strategy of PTSD, and the related risk of suicide, in forthcoming months.

Taking the German Muse out of Music:The Chronicleand US Musical Opinion in World War I

AbstractThe case of conductor Karl Muck and the Boston Symphony Orchestra during World War I is notorious for its combination of nationalist patriotism and opposition to international influence on US concert organizations. Although it seemed on the surface to be a spontaneous uprising against a foreign musician who refused to play “The Star-Spangled Banner,” the public outcry against Muck was part of a larger campaign orchestrated by a shadowy propaganda magazine namedThe Chronicle, published in New York from March 1917 to November 1918. This journal was marketed to the United States’ wealthy elite and was available to subscribers by invitation only. By strategic publication of fake news stories and xenophobic opinion pieces, editor Richard Fletcher spread fear and suspicion through the most rarefied strata of US society. The journal was instrumental in blacklisting suspicious arts organizations and fomenting prejudice against enemy aliens. This article examines for the first time the role of this magazine in the banning of German-language operas at the Met, the internment of Muck, and the near-elimination of German repertoire from US orchestral programs.

Deployed fears and suspended solidarity along the migratory route in Europe

ABSTRACT The aim of the paper is to understand the reasons for the spread of fear, the suspension of solidarity, and the securitizing national and local context along the European migratory route. A settlement located on the Hungarian side of the Serbian-Hungarian border, heavily affected by international migration in 2015, is the focus of inquiry. The mayor of the village is a major figure in the Hungarian far-right who mobilized not only the political scene but also various segments of the media to create and legitimize a discourse involving threatened villagers (and more generally, threatened Hungarians and Europeans) and a migrant menace (perceived as non-European, non-white, and non-human). Based on an ethnographic inquiry, the paper reveals the variety of discourses and attitudes which emerged as immediate reactions to people on the move appearing in large numbers in the village. These initial reactions included empathy and a willingness to help which rapidly disappeared. The paper analyses how welcoming acts and voices were silenced and eliminated, and a hegemony of fear was constructed. It contributes to the special issue by showing how fragile solidarity with refugees can be, and how its elimination can occur if social precarity and far-right politics are combined.

Neural correlates of conceptual-level fear generalization in posttraumatic stress disorder.

Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) may develop when mechanisms for making accurate distinctions about threat relevance have gone awry. Generalization across conceptually related objects has been hypothesized based on clinical observation in PTSD, but the neural mechanisms remain unexplored. Recent trauma-exposed military veterans (n = 46) were grouped into PTSD (n = 23) and non-PTSD (n = 23). Participants learned to generalize fear across conceptual categories (animals or tools) of semantically related items that were partially reinforced by shock during functional magnetic resonance imaging. Conditioned fear learning was quantified by shock expectancy and skin conductance response (SCR). Relative to veteran controls, PTSD subjects exhibited a stronger neural response associated with fear generalization to the reinforced object category in the striatum, anterior cingulate cortex, amygdala, occipitotemporal cortex, and insula (Z > 2.3; p < 0.05; whole-brain corrected). Based on SCR, both groups generalized the shock contingency to the reinforced conceptual category, but learning was not significantly different between groups. We found that PTSD was associated with an enhanced neural response in fronto-limbic, midline, and occipitotemporal regions to a learned representation of threat that is based on previously established conceptual knowledge of the relationship between basic-level exemplars within a semantic category. Behaviorally, veterans with PTSD were somewhat slower to differentiate threat and safety categories as compared with trauma-exposed veteran controls owing in part to an initial overgeneralized behavioral response to the safe category. These results have implications for understanding how fear spreads across semantically related concepts in PTSD.

Costly avoidance triggered by categorical fear generalization

Fear generalization refers to the spread of acquired fear to novel stimuli that resemble the original fear-related stimulus. Preliminary evidence suggests that excessive fear generalization is a pathogenic feature of anxiety disorders, however, it remains unclear how fear generalization affects pathological avoidance. The current study thus aimed to examine the link between categorical fear generalization and costly avoidance. By combining a fear acquisition training phase and an avoidance test, the current findings showed that acquired fear spreads to novel stimuli that belonged to the same category of the original fear-related stimuli, but not to those that belonged to the fear-irrelevant categories. Importantly, participants avoided these fear-related novel stimuli despite costs. The current findings indicate that categorical fear generalization triggers costly avoidance. In terms of clinical implication, a decrease in costly avoidance aligned with a decrease in US expectancies. This emphasizes that behavioral approach may initiate extinction learning.

Patient-reported outcomes in melanoma survivors at 1, 3 and 5years post-diagnosis: a population-based cross-sectional study.

There is a lack of population-based data describing patient reported outcomes (PROs) in melanoma survivors which could guide the development of interventions and resources. This study assessed overall quality of life (QoL), self-reported symptoms and unmet information needs in melanoma survivors 1, 3 or 5years post-diagnosis. A cross-sectional postal survey was conducted in Victoria, Australia, with eligible melanoma survivors identified from a population-based cancer registry. Patient-reported outcome measures included the EuroQoL 5-Dimension 5-Level (EQ-5D-5L), and self-reported symptoms, difficulties and information needs. Associations between demographic, disease and care-related factors and QoL were also assessed. A total of 476 melanoma survivors participated in the study (response rate 46.5%). Anxiety and depressive symptoms were more prevalent in survivors compared to the general population (30.7% vs 21.6%; p < 0.01). Fear of cancer recurrence (48.3%) and fear of cancer spreading (37.8%) were the most commonly reported symptom items, and approximately one in five melanoma survivors had unmet information needs related to psychological aspects of living with melanoma. Recurrent melanoma, living in a nursing home, chronic comorbidities, and melanoma diagnosed at > 2mm thickness were associated with lower QoL. A large proportion of melanoma survivors reported ongoing quality of life deficits, fear of cancer recurrence, as well as unmet information needs up to 5years after diagnosis. Patients may benefit from tailored informational resources and interventions that address the psychological aspects of living with and beyond melanoma.

Is faster better? Political and ethical framings of pace and space

AbstractConsidering the recent ‘temporal turn’ in International Relations scholarship, this article proposes that space and time are concepts that ‘thicken’ one another in several ways, with significant implications for understanding foreign policy and world politics. In the discourse of security and governance, space–time frames work together to facilitate and legitimize certain policies, actions, and reactions, and imply distinct perspectives on ethics. Drawing on the examples of United States (US) drone use, reactions to the event that has become known as ‘Benghazi’, and fears of the global spread of disease, this study investigates how temporal and spatial framings conceptualize effective and ethical security and governance. Arguing that space–time frames take shape from the resonance of political, theoretical, and cultural texts, four frames are elaborated including ‘space–time liberations’, ‘space–time oppressions’, ‘space–time strategics’, and ‘space–time reflexivities’. The article concludes by suggesting that contradictions and tensions between the frames along with postcolonial and decolonial perspectives can be leveraged to interrogate and displace dominant notions of pace and space in the practice and study of world politics, and that this is a form of scholarly and political reflexivity.

Characterization of goat prions demonstrates geographical variation of scrapie strains in Europe and reveals the composite nature of prion strains

Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) is the only animal prion which has been recognized as a zoonotic agent so far. The identification of BSE in two goats raised the need to reliably identify BSE in small ruminants. However, our understanding of scrapie strain diversity in small ruminants remains ill-defined, thus limiting the accuracy of BSE surveillance and spreading fear that BSE might lurk unrecognized in goats. We investigated prion strain diversity in a large panel of European goats by a novel experimental approach that, instead of assessing the neuropathological profile after serial transmissions in a single animal model, was based on the direct interaction of prion isolates with several recipient rodent models expressing small ruminants or heterologous prion proteins. The findings show that the biological properties of scrapie isolates display different patterns of geographical distribution in Europe and suggest that goat BSE could be reliably discriminated from a wide range of biologically and geographically diverse goat prion isolates. Finally, most field prion isolates showed composite strain features, with discrete strain components or sub-strains being present in different proportions in individual goats or tissues. This has important implications for understanding the nature and evolution of scrapie strains and their transmissibility to other species, including humans.

Fear of COVID-19: A cross-sectional study among general population in Telangana during lockdown

Background: The Novel Coronavirus-19, emerged from Wuhan, China, spread throughout the world. This pandemic with its influence on each and every aspect of life, posed a much greater impact on mental health. Heightened level of anxiety, fear of contracting the virus, future uncertainties are commonly seen among general population during pandemics. Aim: To assess the fear of COVID-19 among general population of Telangana during lockdown period in India. Materials and Methods: An online survey was conducted using Google Forms. Fear of Covid-19 scale was used for assessment. Non probability snow ball sampling technique was used for collecting data. Results: A total of 245 responses were received, of which 10 responders had pre-existing psychiatric illness and were excluded. Of the remaining 235 participants, 47.2% were females and 52.8% were males. Mean age was 31.46 ± 9.82 years. 54% were educated till post-graduate level. 51.1% were married. 32% were health care professionals and involved in essential care services. The mean score of Fear of Covid-19 scale was 14.27 ± 4.29. 74.9% participants had fear of Covid-19. 61.7% felt uncomfortable when thinking about the novel Corona virus. More than 39.6% candidates were distressed on hearing/watching news about Covid-19. Around 13% participants reported disturbance in their sleep due to worry of getting infected with Corona virus. Findings imply that there was fear of Covid-19 spread among general population of Telangana during lockdown period. Keywords: COVID-19, Fear, Lockdown, Pandemic, Telangana.

Impact of COVID-19 outbreak in blood transfusion services in India: Experience from tertiary care blood centres in Kerala: A short review

Blood Transfusion Service (BTS) in India faced numerous challenges during the COVID-19 outbreak and the following imposed country lockdown. We aim to identify the challenges faced by selected blood centers and explore the mitigation strategies implemented during the COVID 19 pandemic and subsequent lockdown. Diminished donor inflow, lack of uniform donor selection criteria during the initial period, fear of COVID-19 spread to blood donors and staff personnel, shortage of available blood units, staff personnel transportation, handling of medical records, and concerns about transfusion-transmitted COVID-19 were the major challenges faced in our blood centers. Personal invitation of donors, public announcements, and in-house donation drives were implemented to improve donor inflow. Institute level donor selection protocol was developed and followed before the national guidelines were established. Restricted donor entry, stringent donor selection, and adequate sanitization strategies were the key steps adopted to ensure the safety of donors and staffs. In the interim, there was a reduction in blood unit requirement due to reduced patient inflow. Staff duty pattern was allocated on a rotation basis. The novel standard operating procedure was developed and implemented for handling COVID-19 positive or suspected blood samples. BTS should always be vigilant to adopt new practices even before guidelines are set by regulatory authorities and are liable to follow the guidelines. Restrictive blood transfusion strategies need to be emphasized in the country.

Problems of management of non-corona respiratory diseases in the era of COVID-19

This pandemic, COVID-19 caused by the novel coronavirus SARS-CoV-2, has not only devastated the public health, but also posed an immense impact on the societal, economical, and geopolitical conditions. The severe stress on essential health services has also adversely affected the prevalence, recognition, and management of non-COVID diseases. In particular, the management of respiratory diseases has suffered the most because of the clinical similarities between COVID-19 and non-COVID flu, respiratory allergies, pneumonias, and respiratory failure. Because of these similarities, some of the patients tend to avoid seeking treatment lest they be diagnosed as COVID-19 infection. Diagnostic tests such as spirometry and invasive investigations (bronchoscopies and thoracoscopies) are avoided by physicians for the fear of spread of the infection. Patients with acute worsening of asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease requiring nebulization therapy are thus not even entertained by medical facilities. Many patients themselves are often afraid of inhalation therapy. In this article, we have summarized the problems faced by the patients suffering from respiratory disorders and their physicians as well as some of the important issues related to their therapy during this pandemic.

An idea of risk-neutral momentum and market fear

This study models a link between ex-ante autocorrelation in expected returns and risk-neutral momentum, enabling a straightforward interpretation of market sentiment. Correspondingly, concepts of fractal Brownian motion are applied to option implied volatility term structures. Based on an empirical investigation of daily SP500 and Euro Stoxx 50 data (2006–2018), we find that the expected return momentum varies over time, as fear spreads much faster than investor confidence can be regained. Thus, we conclude that risk-neutral momentum is a novel perspective for further research in the fields of risk management, asset allocation, and behavioral finance.

Knowledge, Belief and Practice of Cervical Cancer Screening and Prevention among Women of Taraba, North-East Nigeria.

Objective:The rising prevalence of cancer of the cervix especially in developing countries gives cause for concern. Fortunately, it can be prevented especially when the women at risk possess correct knowledge, have the right belief and access to screening and prevention services. Previous studies have reported poor knowledge and screening practices among women in developing countries raising the fear of continued spread. The aim of the study was to establish the cervical cancer knowledge, belief and prevention/screening practices among women in Taraba, North-East Nigeria. Methods:The study adopted a cross sectional survey design. A self-designed structured and validated questionnaire with a reliability index of .82 was employed to elicit information from 978 women of child bearing age. Data collected were analysed using percentage, mean, Chi-Square and ANOVA statistics. Result:The findings of the study revealed that the women of Taraba had appropriate knowledge about the nature of cervical cancer (73. 2%) signs and symptoms of cervical cancer (76.5%) risk factors of cervical cancer (88.0%), and prevention of cervical cancer (90.3%). The women did not have the right beliefs about the concept of cervical cancer and its preventive measures. They believed that the screening procedure is painful; they were too young to contract the disease and risk stigmatization if they went for screening. Only 45.2% of the women regularly engaged in screening and other prevention practices. Location of residence, and religion significantly determined knowledge and screening/prevention practices (P<0.05) while marital status and age (P<0.05) significantly affected the respondents’ beliefs about cervical cancer and prevention practices. Location of residence, and religion significantly determined knowledge and screening/prevention practices (P<0.05) while marital status and age (P<0.05) significantly affected the respondents’ beliefs about cervical cancer and prevention practices. Conclusion:It was concluded that knowledge about cervical cancer did not translate to right belief and good practice, and that belief and practice were affected by demographic variables of location of residence, religion, marital status and age.

دور التغطية الاعلامية للقنوات الفضائية العراقية في تشكيل اتجاهات الجمهور نحو الارهاب ( دراسة ميدانية لعينة من جمهور مدينة بغداد )

Violence is one of the most serious threats facing societies because it affects their internal structure and threatens the security and stability of society. It is classified as one of the types of security crises that are emerging in Arab and Islamic societies in particular, and in most countries of the world in general. The threat of this crisis is increasing. Terrorism is considered as one of the most serious aspects of that all the countries of the world, currently, suffer from. The terrorism has begun to penetrate deep into society in one way or another starting from the Second World War, which led to the emergence of leftist movements in Western Europe, Japan, France, Italy and other countries as a result of emerging ideas and ideologies aimed at political change, especially with the end of the sixties of the twentieth century. This period witnessed growing the phenomenon of terrorism; extending the impact of this phenomenon; and developing terrorist groups whose activities extended beyond their national borders. This led to an expansion of terrorism in what is known as international terrorism. Terrorist attacks began to appear in Arab and Muslim societies from time to time. Therefore, the Arab world witnessed a growing phenomenon of violence and terrorism and the multiplicity of religious political violence organizations that differed from other violent currents in other regions of the world. The risk of terrorist operations is greater if they originate from ideological or economic interests that serve a certain group, and whose influence on members of society widens so that innocent and protected lives are destroyed. This causes waste private and public property; and spreads terror and panic in the areas where they operate. Such terror activities lead to shaking security and stability and spread fear among individuals that left large numbers of innocent casualties.

The relationship between fear generalization and pain modulation: an investigation in healthy participants.

Background and aims Pain-related fear and its subsequent generalization is key to the development and maintenance of chronic pain disability. Research has shown that pain-related fear acquired through classical conditioning generalizes following a gradient, that is, novel movements that are proprioceptively similar to the original pain-associated movement elicit more fear. Studies suggest that classical conditioning can also modulate pain and conditioned fear seems to mediate this effect. However, it remains uninvestigated whether this is also the case for generalized fear. Methods In a voluntary joystick movement paradigm, one movement (conditioned stimulus; CS+) was followed by pain (pain-US), and another was not (CS-). Generalization to five novel movements (generalization stimuli; GSs) with varying levels of similarity to the CSs was tested when paired with an at-pain-threshold intensity stimulus (threshold-USs). We collected self-reported fear and pain, as well as eyeblink startle responses as an additional index of conditioned fear. Results Results showed a fear generalization gradient in the ratings, but not in the startle measures. The data did not support the idea that fear generalization mediates spreading of pain. Conclusions Despite the lack of effects in the current study, this is a promising novel approach to investigate pain modulation in the context of chronic pain. Implications This study replicates the finding that pain-related fear spreads selectively towards movements that are proprioceptively more similar to the original pain-eliciting movement. Although results did not support the idea that such generalized fear mediates spreading of pain, the study provides a promising approach to investigate pain modulation by pain-associated movements.

Terrorism and its Negative Effects on Sub-Saharan Africa: The Case of Al-Shabaab

In contemporary times, the most pressing issues threatening the tranquility and global stability, particularly in Africa, are the heinous activities of terrorist groups. The word “terrorism” caught the world’s attention through the 9/11 incident, although it has been in existence for centuries. There have been numerous definitions for the act of terrorism, yet there is no universally approved definition which is accepted by all countries. This article, therefore, seeks to elucidate terrorism from different perspectives and also elaborate on its causes as well. Most importantly, this article focuses on Al-Shabaab as a violent extremist group with an emphasis on their background, their violent activities, the recruitment process as well as their source of funding. Additionally, their interconnection with the Al-Qaeda group will be dealt with as well as how terrorism has negatively affected a lot of people through the spread of violence, fear, and instability throughout the regions of Africa. The Al-Shabaab terrorist group in Somalia is considered amongst the deadliest militant groups across the continent of Africa, after the Boko Haram terrorist group in Nigeria. Some of the heinous activities carried out by this Al-Shabab terrorist group comprises of intimidation, bombing, suicide attacks, kidnapping, and gunfire of unarmed innocent citizens both within and outside Somalia. The inception of Al-Shabaab was as a result of the power vacuum that was created in 1991 after the warlords were unsuccessful in bringing into being any governance system during the fall of the last Somalia central government. Owing to this power vacuum fabricated, it has therefore empowered the Islamic court's leaders to assume informal authorities in some parts of south-central Somalia. Despite the fact that the Islamic court defeated these warlords, they were eventually defeated on the grounds of a national security threat by Ethiopian forces invading Somalia.

The Future of Globalization

Since 2016 populism at the polls has begun to threaten the longstanding western commitment to globalization, i.e., free markets and open societies as the best model for promoting world peace and prosperity. Nationalist now challenges this model in the US, the UK, and several other European countries. The challenges reflect discontent with the last years of economic underachievement, fears of immigration and terrorism in Europe and on the Mexican border, and a wide spread fear of the hollowing out of the middle and working classes due to unfair Chinese exports. But the concerns are greater than they need to be. Things are turning around, and recovery has set in. Globalization is thought to be the most effect way, over time, to generate global peace and prosperity, and to generate economy opportunity through competition. It is well supported by a deep infrastructure of supporting institutions in the governmental, commercial and financial sectors. But populism has set in and has attracted a lot of voter interest in shaking things up. Itr is essentially a challenge to the elites and therefore we will have tp wait for the political process to to return to the center, but globalization will survive in the end.

Knowledge and attitudes on pediatric vaccinations and intention to vaccinate in a sample of pregnant women from the City of Rome

BackgroundIn recent years, pediatric immunization rates in Italy have decreased well below the recommended thresholds, largely due to an increase in scepticism about the efficacy and safety of vaccines. We aimed to identify the degree of such scepticism, and the factors driving it, among a sample of pregnant women in the City of Rome. MethodsWe conducted a cross-sectional survey on a sample of pregnant women attending antenatal classes (CANs) in Rome through distribution of a self-administered questionnaire. Multiple logistic regression models were built to analyze the determinants of knowledge, attitudes and intention to vaccinate in this population. ResultsA total of 458 pregnant women attending CANs in 36 family health centers and two hospitals in Rome answered the survey. Mean age was 32.9 (±5.0) years, and over 90% of women were in their first pregnancy. More than 26% of respondents showed a good level of knowledge of the safety and efficacy of vaccines, but there were high rates of uncertainty or agreement with some of the most common anti-vaccination sentiments. Only 75% of women were sure about vaccinating their children with the hexavalent vaccine, and 64.3% with MMR. A good level of knowledge was the strongest predictor of positive attitudes towards vaccination (OR 11.61, 95% CI 6.43–20.96), which, in turn, influenced the intention to vaccinate for most vaccines with the perception of the benefit of immunization for protection against disease. ConclusionsScepticism about the safety, efficacy and importance of vaccines is associated to pregnant women’s hesitancy to vaccinate their children, suggesting the need to develop strategies to increase vaccine acceptance in the antenatal period. The capacity of health care professionals, particularly midwives, to correctly deliver information to future parents should be strengthened in order to reduce the spread of misinformation and fear of vaccine safety.