A critical analysis of the impacts of COVID-19 on the global economy and ecosystems and opportunities for circular economy strategies

Impact of the virtual anti-hypertensive educational campaign towards knowledge, attitude, and practice of hypertension management during the COVID-19 pandemic

BACKGROUND

One of the efforts to reduce hypertension rates in the community is through an educational campaign that refers to the NIH's National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute curricula or abbreviated as NHLBI. However, during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, one of the hardest hit areas is health promotion, and there is a significant obstacle regarding the most effective way to transfer knowledge, attitude and practice towards society without transmitting the virus.

AIM

To evaluate the impact of the virtual anti-hypertensive educational campaign towards knowledge, attitude, and the practice of hypertension management in the primary care setting during the COVID-19 pandemic.

METHODS

An online action research with a randomized crossover-controlled trial using a pretest-posttest control group design. The study was conducted in October 2020-April 2021. The population in this study were patients with hypertension who were treated in the Mojo primary health care setting. A purposive sampling technique was done to receive 110 participants using an online questionnaire and invitation letter.

RESULTS

A total of 110 participants were included in the analysis, 55 in the intervention group and 55 in the control group. Following the Virtual Anti-Hypertensive Educational Campaign implementation, the only parameter that showed significant improvement was knowledge and attitude (P < 0.001). There is no significant change in the practice parameters (P = 0.131).

CONCLUSION

The Virtual Anti-Hypertensive Educational Campaign implementation in our study population seems to be effective to improve knowledge and attitude of participants, nevertheless, this program seems to be ineffective to improve the practice of hypertension management aspect in participants. Future study with longer durations and more comprehensive programs need to be done to scrutinize the clinical impact of this program nationwide.

Pattern and perceived changes in quality of life of Vietnamese medical and nursing students during the COVID-19 pandemic

BACKGROUND

The COVID-19 pandemic and governments' response lead to dramatical change in quality of life worldwide. However, the extent of this change in Vietnamese medical and nursing students has not been documented.

OBJECTIVES

The study aims to describe the quality of life and changes in quality of life of medical and nursing students during the COVID-19 pandemic and examine the association of quality of life and changes in quality of life with fear of COVID-19 and other socio-economic and demographic factors.

METHODS

The study was a cross-sectional study on all students of Hanoi Medical University from 3 majors: General Medicine, Preventive Medicine, Nursing (3672 invited students); from 7th to 29th of April 2020; using an online questionnaire that included demographic and academic information, the Vietnamese version of the SF-36 Quality of Life questionnaire and the Fear of COVID-19 Scale (FCV-19S). Linear and modified Poisson regression was used to examine the association between quality of life, changes in quality of life and other factors.

RESULTS

The number of participants was 1583 (response rate 43%). Among 8 dimensions of the SF-36 (ranged 0-100), Vitality had the lowest score with a median score of 46. The median physical composite score (PCS) of the sample was 40.6 (IQR:20.8-53.2), 33.5% of the sample had an above-population average PCS score. The median mental composite score (MCS) of the sample was 20.3 (IQR:3.8-31.7), and 98.2% had an MCS score below average. 9.9% (95%CI:8.5%-11.4%) of the population reported a significant negative change in the quality of life. Fear of COVID-19 was not associated with significant changes in quality of life, nor MCS while having some association with PCS (Coef:-5.39;95%CI:-3to-7.8). Perceived reduction in quality of life was also associated with: being on clinical rotation COVID-19 (PR:1.5;95%CI:1.05-2.2), difficulties affording health services (PR:1.4;95%CI:1.02-1.95), obesity (PR:2.38;95%CI:1.08-5.25) and chronic disease (PR:1.92;95%CI:1.23-3), typical symptoms (PR:1.85; 95%CI:1.23-2.78) and atypical symptoms of COVID-19 (PR:2.32;95%CI:1.41-3.81).

CONCLUSION

The majority of medical and nursing students had below average quality of life, with lower vitality and mental composite health score in the settings of COVID-19. Perceived decrease in quality of life was associated with clinical rotation, difficulties affording healthcare services and was not associated with Fear of COVID-19.

Synchronous Teleconsultation and Monitoring Service Targeting COVID-19: Leveraging Insights for Postpandemic Health Care

BACKGROUND

Although a great number of teleconsultation services have been developed during the COVID-19 pandemic, studies assessing usability and health care provider satisfaction are still incipient.

OBJECTIVE

This study aimed to describe the development, implementation, and expansion of a synchronous teleconsultation service targeting patients with symptoms of COVID-19 in Brazil, as well as to assess its usability and health care professionals' satisfaction.

METHODS

This mixed methods study was developed in 5 phases: (1) the identification of components, technical and functional requirements, and system architecture; (2) system and user interface development and validation; (3) pilot-testing in the city of Divinópolis; (4) expansion in the cities of Divinópolis, Teófilo Otoni, and Belo Horizonte for Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais faculty and students; and (5) usability and satisfaction assessment, using Likert-scale and open-ended questions.

RESULTS

During pilot development, problems contacting users were solved by introducing standardized SMS text messages, which were sent to users to obtain their feedback and keep track of them. Until April 2022, the expanded system served 31,966 patients in 146,158 teleconsultations. Teleconsultations were initiated through chatbot in 27.7% (40,486/146,158) of cases. Teleconsultation efficiency per city was 93.7% (13,317/14,212) in Teófilo Otoni, 92.4% (11,747/12,713) in Divinópolis, and 98.8% (4981/5041) in Belo Horizonte (university campus), thus avoiding in-person assistance for a great majority of patients. In total, 50 (83%) out of 60 health care professionals assessed the system's usability as satisfactory, despite a few system instability problems.

CONCLUSIONS

The system provided updated information about COVID-19 and enabled remote care for thousands of patients, which evidenced the critical role of telemedicine in expanding emergency services capacity during the pandemic. The dynamic nature of the current pandemic required fast planning, implementation, development, and updates in the system. Usability and satisfaction assessment was key to identifying areas for improvement. The experience reported here is expected to inform telemedicine strategies to be implemented in a postpandemic scenario.

Exploring the Social Trend Indications of Utilizing E-Commerce during and after COVID-19's Hit

COVID-19 is a major global crisis affecter, changing global norms and societal behavioral models. Many companies have faced existential crises, but on the other hand, businesses that were and are helping others to boost digitalization, ICT and software solutions deployment, remote communications integration, e-commerce & e-services, and so on, have boosted their businesses, as people shifted online during the global lockdown and international travel restrictions. Our work explores the trend of e-commerce and e-services utilization during the ease of restrictions and the social distancing period to forecast the trend continuation patterns after the pandemic. An online survey was conducted and targeted individuals in Saudi Arabia and Egypt, resulting in 155 participants. The data were analyzed from four perspectives: demographics, COVID-19 health impact, trend analysis, and regression analysis. The results indicate heavy utilization of e-commerce and e-services during the global movement restrictions and travel bans. This trend has, however, significantly reduced during the ease of restrictions and social distancing period. Utilizing e-commerce and e-services in Saudi Arabia and Egypt, based on the research data, is positively correlated to the outbreak conditions. On the other hand, current data still does not give clear indications, and this pattern is going to be mostly, partly, or not at all permanent now as societies are returning to mostly a free movement of people and marginally restricted social distancing times.

Smart and Resilient Transformation of Manufacturing Firms

The smart and resilient transformation of manufacturing firms has flourished in the last decade. This paper investigates the smart and resilient transformation of manufacturing firms with the application of digital services. It uses a Serbian data set of 136 manufacturing firms from the Digital Servitization Survey from 2022 coordinated by IFIP WG5.7. The authors applied a different method approach through social network analysis, correlation analysis, and interviews with representatives from the manufacturing firms. The main results show that manufacturing firms that apply an adequate combination of services and digital technologies have the highest impact on the network of manufacturing firms. Moreover, the results show that applying digital technologies, such as additive manufacturing/3D printing, big data analytics, and digital twin, increases the gross annual turnover of manufacturing firms in the COVID-19 era. Finally, the results show that for a successful smart and resilient transformation, manufacturing firms need to develop a strategy and motivation oriented to profit to be resilient enough to withstand market change.

The Impact of COVID-19 on the Sustainable Development Goals: Achievements and Expectations

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a significant impact on almost all the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), leaving no country unaffected. It has caused a shift in political agendas, but also in lines of research. At the same time, the world is trying to make the transition to a more sustainable economic model. The research objectives of this paper are to explore the impact of COVID-19 on the fulfilment of the SDGs with regard to the research of the scientific community, and to analyze the presence of the Circular Economy (CE) in the literature. To this end, this research applies bibliometric analysis and a systematic review of the literature, using VOSviewer for data visualization. Five clusters were detected and grouped according to the three dimensions of sustainability. The extent of the effects of the health, economic and social crisis resulting from the pandemic, in addition to the climate crisis, is still uncertain, but it seems clear that the main issues are inefficient waste management, supply chain issues, adaptation to online education and energy concerns. The CE has been part of the solution to this crisis, and it is seen as an ideal model to be promoted based on the opportunities detected.

Green supply chain management/green finance: a bibliometric analysis of the last twenty years by using the Scopus database

Mostly, the product manufacturer and activities related to transportation have a greater influence on the supply chain and the environment. Hence, the green investment in water, biodiversity protection, waste treatment, resources, and climate change alleviation help in enhancing industrial production. Thus, for the enhancement of green growth, the industries must adopt green financing by making investments in ecology, climate change, and carbon reduction. Despite having the greatest growth in green supply chain management, still, the implementations of greening the product and processes have not been seen properly in many industries. A bibliometric analysis was conducted through VOS viewer version 1.6.7. of last twenty years (2001-2021). A total of 2385 articles were retrieved from the Scopus database. The results revealed that China, India, Iran, and Taiwan have a vast collection of articles and have very strong international collaborations. The most cited authors were Sarkis, J., Zhu, Q., and Khan, S.A.R. The results also suggest that green supply chain management research was related to the field of engineering, environmental science, energy sciences, social sciences, and business management. Some new areas are discovered like green innovation, green information technology, green productivity, corporate environmental responsibility, green investments, green credit, and green credit policy. As evidenced from our bibliographic database search, it is observed that integrated work on green supply chain management and green finance is limited, and this makes this research work to be novel. This study is beneficial for credit managers and policymakers.

Strategic minerals: Global challenges post-COVID-19

In 2020, many countries endorsed lockdown measures, closed their borders, and practiced social distancing in a bid to contain COVID-19. These moves, however, disrupted global production and supply chains; no economic sector remained fully intact. The pandemic has exposed the vulnerability of supply chains in a globalized world, perhaps none more so than those linked to the distribution of essential raw materials. Minerals are considered raw materials, the extraction of which has important implications for a country's sovereignty and economic autonomy. They are found in abundance in consumer goods such as smartphones, cell phone batteries, computer monitors, cards, and other electrical and electronic products whose useful life has ended. In response to the health and economic problems arising from the current crisis, several countries have moved ahead and outlined post-COVID-19 strategies for the supply of critical metals, over the medium and long term, to reduce their dependence on other states for these commodities. This paper reflects critically on the positioning of the world's large economies, in the face of the COVID-19 crisis, on strategic minerals.

Commodity dynamism in the COVID-19 crisis: Are gold, oil, and stock commodity prices, symmetrical?

The current research intends to examine the commodities' dynamism connection with stock prices under the COVID-19 crisis. DCC-GARCH modeling was applied to the data of Asian economies, including China, India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, and Pakistan to achieve the study objectives. The study's results indicated a significant connection between gold prices with stock prices and oil prices for all Asian stock markets. The results of the study constructs were symmetrical. In general, the connection grows with the frequency. The lowest frequency months contributed the most to the total relationship, followed by more than 12 months. Overall, gold and oil prices influence the Asian stock markets. These research findings can avoid contagion in times of economic uncertainty. This study also suggested policy implications for better decision-making of key stakeholders. Dynamic coefficient values were about 0.8 of β2 because nations' internal markets were more closely linked. There are also dynamic relationship factors between crude oil and foreign currency markets, where the correlations in India and China have always been around 0.

The impacts of sustainable industrial revolution (IR) on the profitability of Hungarian food companies

There is growing literature on the concept and objectives of corporate sustainability (CS), but less attention is paid to a comprehensive approach to economic, social and ecological factors and industrial revolution (IR). Specifically, this paper contributes to the academic debate on the relationship between CS and IR in agri-food economics using firm-level data. The study used quantitative pathway models to measure the extent to which technologies affect the development of social, ecological and economic factors in Hungarian food manufacturing companies. The research was conducted using partial least squares path modeling (PLS-PM) and categorical principal component analysis (CATPCA) to calculate the direct and indirect effects of IR technologies on profitability outcomes. This study has shown that the livable and sustainable path hypotheses can be confirmed. Consequently, the food manufacturing businesses whose managers think along the viable and sustainable lines tend to be more profitable. However, the ecological and economic factors strengthened the positive impact of the social dimension on food corporate profitability. Decision-makers should not wait for a pie in the sky for emerging sustainability but consciously embrace the CS issues that only provide a direction for the changes.

Knowledge Mapping and Institutional Prospects on Circular Carbon Economy Based on Scientometric Analysis

The circular carbon economy is receiving increasing research attention as an essential tool for reducing carbon emissions and mitigating climate change. However, there is no research on the literature distribution and the current situation of the circular carbon economy studies. This paper presents a scientometric analysis of 1452 academic papers on the circular carbon economy and their references from 2010-2021 using the Citespace visualization network. The results show that research on the circular carbon economy has experienced a relatively gradual growth from 2010 to 2016, followed by an explosive growth from 2016 to 2021. Research cooperation among countries is close, forming a relatively concentrated cooperation network, while the core author group has not yet formed. Furthermore, the research on circular carbon economy strongly correlates with relevant international hotspots and national policy changes, reflecting the instrumental characteristics of circular carbon economy research. We summarized three main research topics through keywords clustering. In addition, we point out the future research directions from technical progress considering industry differences and cooperation, multiple environmental policies and legal system construction, interregional and international cooperation, etc., from an institutional research perspective. This article provides an essential and valuable reference for related research.

Agro-residual biomass and disposable protective face mask: a merger for converting waste to plastic-fiber fuel via an integrative carbonization-pelletization framework

Incineration and landfilling offer possibilities for addressing high-rate management of COVID-waste streams. However, they can be costly and environmentally unsustainable. In addition, they do not allow to convert them to fuels and chemicals as waste-to-energy and waste-to-product technologies. Therefore, we analyzed whether integrating hydrothermal carbonization (HTC) and pelletization can allow converting the surgical face mask (SFM) and biomass to composite plastic-fiber fuel (CPFF). We blended the plastic material and corncob, peanut shell, or sugarcane bagasse at the proportion of 50:50 (%, dry mass basis) for HTC. We performed the thermal pretreatment of blends in an autoclaving reactor at 180 °C and 1.5 MPa. Then we pelletized the hydrochars in a presser machine at 200 MPa and 125 °C. By analyzing the evidence from our study, we recognized the viability of combining the SFM and agricultural residues for CPFF from comparable technical features of our products to standards for premium-grade wood pellets. For instance, the elemental composition of their low-meltable ash was not stoichiometrically sufficient to severely produce slagging and fouling in the equipment for thermal conversion. Although they contained synthetic polymers in their structures, such as polyethylene from filter layers and nylon from the earloop, they emitted CO and NOx below the critical limits of 200 and 500 mg m-3, respectively, for occupational safety. Therefore, we extended the knowledge on waste-to-energy pathways to transform SFM into high-quality hybrid fuel by carbonization and pelletization. Our framework can provide stakeholders opportunities to address plastic and biogenic waste in the context of a circular economy.

Supplementary Information

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s13399-022-03285-4.

Biodiversity in Times of COVID-19 and its Relationship with the Socio-Economic and Health Context: A Look from the Digital Media

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused a pause in people's activities and a socio-economic crisis worldwide due to confinement. This situation is an unprecedented opportunity to understand how these changes may impact biodiversity and its conservation, as well as to study human-nature interaction. Biodiversity plays an essential role in conservation and economic activities, and in countries with greater inequality and low gross domestic product (GDP), biodiversity could have a low priority. Moreover, how biodiversity is prioritized in a society impacts how the citizens view it, and digital news tends to shape biodiversity narratives. The aim of this work was to determine the main trends in biodiversity-related news categories during the COVID-19 pandemic in countries with terrestrial and marine hotspots and relate them to the socioeconomic and public health context of each country. For this, we searched for news on biodiversity and Covid-19 in the first 6 months of the pandemic and related them to GDP, Gini-index, deaths, and infections by Covid-19. Results showed that conservation, public policies, and use of natural resources stood out as the main news categories across countries, with a positive narrative and mostly related to terrestrial rather than marine environments. On the other hand, the socio-economic and public health characteristics of each country had an influence on which aspect of the biodiversity was reflected in the media. For example, countries with greater inequality were associated with tourism news, additionally, countries with low GDP, high cases, and deaths by Covid-19 were associated with news about cultural diversity. In contrast, countries with high GDP and low inequality were associated with news about zoonosis, research and development, public policies, and alien and invasive species.

Smarter and Greener Cities After COVID-19: An Integrated Decision-Making Framework to Prioritize Investment Alternatives

Locking down cities to curb the transmission of coronavirus brought the global economy to a grinding halt. Cities are like engines of growth; when they stop, so does the growth. Therefore, it becomes paramount to build cities that continue to function and do not collapse amidst any crisis. Since economic recovery is underway, this paper examines priority areas for investment to expedite recovery and build back stronger cities. These areas are evaluated based on their contribution to revitalizing public health, economic, social, energy, and environmental sectors. For the analysis, analytical network process (ANP) and fuzzy-VIKOR are applied. ANP obtains the relative importance of sectors and their respective critical factors after solving a complex relationship among them. The economic sector has the highest weight of 25.8% among the five sectors, while job creation has the highest weight of 10.3% among the fifteen factors. Fuzzy-VIKOR is used to evaluate different areas and it is found that renewable energy has a greater contribution to the sustainable recovery of major sectors and the long-term aim of building inclusive green and resilient cities. These insights shall contribute to the conversations already ongoing among city governments, urban planners, civil society organizations, and city dwellers seeking practical solutions to unprecedented challenges posed by the pandemic.

The effect of food insecurity and stress on delay discounting across families: a COVID-19 natural experiment

Background

Delay Discounting is the extent to which one prioritizes smaller immediate rewards over larger, delayed rewards. The ability to prospect into the future is associated with better health decision-making, which suggests that delay discounting is an important intervention target for the prevention and treatment of chronic disease. Delay discounting decreases throughout development and stressful experiences, particularly those that accompany poverty, may influence this developmental trajectory. The current study leveraged the COVID-19 pandemic and resulting economic downturn as a natural experiment to understand how changes in food insecurity and psychological stress may associated with changes in delay discounting among parents, adolescents, and children.

Methods

A stratified cohort of families (N = 76 dyads), established prior to the initial pandemic lockdowns, were asked to complete a follow-up survey in the summer of 2020, during reopening. Thirty-seven (49%) families had an older adolescent (aged 15 – 18 years) in the study and 39 (51%) had an elementary aged child (aged 7 – 12 years) in the follow-up study. Both data collection points included measurements of economic position, psychological stress, food security status, and delay discounting.

Results

The results showed that pandemic food insecurity was associated with greater stress among parents (β = 2.22, t(65.48) = 2.81, p = 0.007). Parents, Adolescents, and children significantly differed in their response to psychological stress during the pandemic (β = -0.03, t(102.45) = -2.58, p = 0.011), which was driven by a trend for children to show greater delay discounting associated with an increase in psychological stress during the pandemic (β = -0.01, p = 0.071), while adolescents and parents showed no change.

Conclusions

These findings add to the evidence that food insecurity is uniquely stressful among parents with no effects on delay discounting. Despite this, we found no evidence that food insecurity was stressful for child or adolescents. A trend in our data suggested that childhood, as compared with adolescence, may be an important developmental period for the association between stress and delay discounting. Future research should continue the longitudinal investigation of childhood stress and the developmental trajectory of delay discounting to ascertain how these effects may persist in adulthood.

Confirming Multiplex RT-qPCR Use in COVID-19 with Next-Generation Sequencing: Strategies for Epidemiological Advantage

Rapid identification and tracking of emerging SARS-CoV-2 variants are critical for understanding the transmission dynamics and developing strategies for interrupting the transmission chain. Next-Generation Sequencing (NGS) is an exceptional tool for whole-genome analysis and deciphering new mutations. The technique has been instrumental in identifying the variants of concern (VOC) and tracking this pandemic. However, NGS is complex and expensive for large-scale adoption, and epidemiological monitoring with NGS alone could be unattainable in limited-resource settings. In this study, we explored the application of RT-qPCR-based detection of the variant identified by NGS. We analyzed a total of 78 deidentified samples that screened positive for SARS-CoV-2 from two timeframes, August 2020 and July 2021. All 78 samples were classified into WHO lineages by whole-genome sequencing and then compared with two commercially available RT-qPCR assays for spike protein mutation(s). The data showed good concordance between RT-qPCR and NGS analysis for specific SARS-CoV-2 lineages and characteristic mutations. RT-qPCR assays are quick and cost-effective and thus can be implemented in synergy with NGS for screening NGS-identified mutations of SARS-CoV-2 for clinical and epidemiological interest. Strategic use of NGS and RT-qPCR can offer several COVID-19 epidemiological advantages.

System dynamics analysis on the effectiveness of vaccination and social mobilization policies for COVID-19 in the United States

The COVID-19 pandemic has presented significant public health and economic challenges worldwide. Various health and non-pharmaceutical policies have been adopted by different countries to control the spread of the virus. To shed light on the impact of vaccination and social mobilization policies during this wide-ranging crisis, this paper applies a system dynamics analysis on the effectiveness of these two types of policies on pandemic containment and the economy in the United States. Based on the simulation of different policy scenarios, the findings are expected to help decisions and mitigation efforts throughout this pandemic and beyond.

Achieving the Sustainable Development Goals in the post-pandemic era

The COVID-19 pandemic continues to pose substantial challenges to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Exploring systematic SDG strategies is urgently needed to aid recovery from the pandemic and reinvigorate global SDG actions. Based on available data and comprehensive analysis of the literature, this paper highlights ongoing challenges facing the SDGs, identifies the effects of COVID-19 on SDG progress, and proposes a systematic framework for promoting the achievement of SDGs in the post-pandemic era. Progress towards attaining the SDGs was already lagging behind even before the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Inequitable distribution of food-energy-water resources and environmental crises clearly threaten SDG implementation. Evidently, there are gaps between the vision for SDG realization and actual capacity that constrain national efforts. The turbulent geopolitical environment, spatial inequities, and trade-offs limit the effectiveness of SDG implementation. The global public health crisis and socio-economic downturn under COVID-19 have further impeded progress toward attaining the SDGs. Not only has the pandemic delayed SDG advancement in general, but it has also amplified spatial imbalances in achieving progress, undermined connectivity, and accentuated anti-globalization sentiment under lockdowns and geopolitical conflicts. Nevertheless, positive developments in technology and improvement in environmental conditions have also occurred. In reflecting on the overall situation globally, it is recommended that post-pandemic SDG actions adopt a "Classification-Coordination-Collaboration" framework. Classification facilitates both identification of the current development status and the urgency of SDG achievement aligned with national conditions. Coordination promotes domestic/international and inter-departmental synergy for short-term recovery as well as long-term development. Cooperation is key to strengthening economic exchanges, promoting technological innovation, and building a global culture of sustainable development that is essential if the endeavor of achieving the SDGs is to be successful. Systematic actions are urgently needed to get the SDG process back on track.

Modelling the persistence of Covid-19 positivity rate in Italy

The current Covid-19 pandemic is severely affecting public health and global economies. In this context, accurately predicting its evolution is essential for planning and providing resources effectively. This paper aims at capturing the dynamics of the positivity rate (PPR) of the novel coronavirus using the Heterogeneous Autoregressive (HAR) model. The use of this model is motivated by two main empirical features arising from the analysis of PPR time series: the changing long-run level and the persistent autocorrelation structure. Compared to the most frequently used Autoregressive Integrated Moving Average (ARIMA) models, the HAR is able to reproduce the strong persistence of the data by using components aggregated at different interval sizes, remaining parsimonious and easy to estimate. The relative merits of the proposed approach are assessed by performing a forecasting study on the Italian dataset. As a robustness check, the analysis of the positivity rate is also conducted by considering the case of the United States. The ability of the HAR-type models to predict the PPR at different horizons is evaluated through several loss functions, comparing the results with those generated by ARIMA models. The Model Confidence Set is used to test the significance of differences in the predictive performances of the models under analysis. Our findings suggest that HAR-type models significantly outperform ARIMA specifications in terms of forecasting accuracy. We also find that the PPR could represent an important metric for monitoring the evolution of hospitalizations, as the peak of patients in intensive care units occurs within 12-16 days after the peak in the positivity rate. This can help governments in planning socio-economic and health policies in advance.

Acceptance and Adherence to COVID-19 Vaccination-The Role of Cognitive and Emotional Representations

Vaccine hesitation is a topic of utmost importance, with the COVID-19 pandemic serving as a clear reminder of its timeliness. Besides evaluating COVID-19 vaccine acceptance in a sample of Portuguese people, this study aims at understanding cognitive and emotional representations related to vaccination, and their influence on vaccination hesitation. A cross-sectional online survey was conducted between 27 December 2020 and 27 January 2021. It assessed cognitive and emotional COVID-19 representations; vaccination status; cognitive and emotional representations of vaccination and perceived necessity and concerns about vaccines. Of 31 × 58 participants, 91% accepted taking a COVID-19 vaccine. Among several other significant findings, women (71.3%) more often considered that the pandemic affected their lives (p < 0.001) and were more often concerned with being infected (p < 0.001). Likewise, there were significantly more female participants concerned about taking a COVID-19 vaccine and its possible effects, when compared to the number of male participants (p < 0.001). The number of participants with a higher education level that were more worried about becoming infected was greater (p = 0.001), when compared with those less educated. Regarding age groups, people aged 18 to 24 had fewer concerned participants (9.6%), while the number of individuals aged 55 to 64 had the most (p < 0.001). Somewhat surprisingly, perceiving oneself as extremely informed about COVID-19 was not associated with greater vaccine acceptance (OR = 1.534 [1.160−2.029]; (p = 0.003)). Moreover, people aged 25 to 64 years old and with lower education level were more likely not to accept vaccination (OR = 2.799 [1.085−7.221]; (p = 0.033)). Finally, being more concerned about taking a vaccine lowers its acceptance (OR = 4.001 [2.518−6.356]; (p < 0.001)). Cognitive and emotional representations have a great impact and are reliable predictors of vaccine acceptance. Thus, it is of extreme importance that public health messages be adapted to the different characteristics of the population.

Smart Building Technologies in Response to COVID-19

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a huge impact on society. Scientists are working to mitigate the impact in many ways. As a field closely related to human life, building engineering can make a great contribution. In this article, we started with the concept of the smart building as our guide. The impact of COVID-19 on daily energy consumption, information and communication technology, the ventilation of the interior environment of buildings, and the higher demand for new energy technologies such as electric vehicles is an entry point. We discuss how the concept of the smart building and related technologies (refrigeration, measurement, sensor networks, robotics, local energy generation, and storage) could help human society respond to the pandemic. We also analyze the current problems and difficulties that smart buildings face and the possible future directions of this technology.

Segmentation by Motivations in Sustainable Coastal and Marine Destinations: A Study in Jacó, Costa Rica

Coastal and marine tourism offers a wide variety of activities that can be sustainable due to the characteristics of its natural and cultural attractions. The present study was carried out in Jacó, a sustainable destination with coastal and marine characteristics of Costa Rica, with the objectives (i) of identifying the motivations of tourist demand; (ii) segmenting the tourist demand; (iii) establishing a relationship between the segments and sociodemographic aspects; and (iv) determining the relationship between segments of demand and satisfaction and loyalty. This quantitative study collected a sample of 304 valid questionnaires on-site in June 2021. For data analysis, a factorial analysis and non-hierarchical K-means segmentation were performed. The results show five motivational dimensions: “Learning and coastal experience”; “Nature”; “Rest and safety”; “Water sports”; and “Nightlife”—and three segments of tourists: “Multiple motives”; “Passive tourists”; and “Eco-Coastal”. The “Eco-Coastal” segment was the most satisfied in terms of enjoying the coastal nature of the destination. The “Multiple motives” group showed the highest intentions to return, recommend, and spread positive word of mouth. These findings will serve as management guides for coastal and marine destination managers and will help adapt these tourism sites to the new demand instigated by the global health crisis.

The barriers to adapting accounting practices to circular economy implementation: an evidence from Ghana

Purpose

The rapid development in the circular economy phenomenon raises the prospects of potential tension between the existing accounting practices and the principles of circular economy. This study, therefore, aims to investigate the barriers to adapting the current accounting practices to circular economy implementation.

Design/methodology/approach

The study uses exploratory qualitative study design, and semi-structured interviews were conducted among professional accountants in Ghana. Purposive sampling technique was used to recruit respondents, and data saturation was achieved with 45 respondents. Data collection and analysis were undertaken concurrently and emerging themes were investigated as the study progressed.

Findings

The results indicate that there are several barriers to adapting the current accounting practices to circular economy implementation. The specific barriers as revealed in the data analysis are: accounting reporting barriers, financial/economic barriers, technological barriers, managerial/behavioral barriers, organizational barriers and institutional barriers.

Originality/value

The study responded to a global call by coalition circular accounting to identify and potentially over accounting related challenges that impedes the transition to circular economy. The study’s originality stems from the fact that it explores the issue from a developing country perspective, which has received limited attention in the extant literature.

Private Firm Support for Circular Economy Regulation in the EU Policy Context

As an empirical investigation of firm support for circular economy regulation in the European Union (EU) context, this paper is the first to connect the research field on corporate political activity with the growing research field on the circular economy. The paper presents these two research streams, draws on theories such as the resource-based view, and employs a hierarchical regression framework to formulate and test six hypotheses on what drives firms to support circular economy regulation. We find that smaller firms show more support for circular economy regulation than larger firms do and identify two moderating effects: the stock listing seems to moderate the relationship between firm size and a firm’s support for circular economy regulation; and a firm’s supply chain position has a counterintuitive negative moderating effect on the relationship between slack resources and a firm’s support for circular economy regulation. We discuss null findings and suggest avenues for future research at this under-researched intersection of policies and firms in the circular economy context.

Examining Knowledge Diffusion in the Circular Economy Domain: a Main Path Analysis

The circular economy (CE) field has recently attracted significant interest from academics and practitioners. CE represents a departure from the linear economy, which is characterised by unsustainable resource production and consumption. The growing number of publications necessitates a comprehensive analysis of this field. This is the first systematic examination of the knowledge base and knowledge diffusion pathways in the CE domain. We analyse a Web of Science dataset containing 5431 articles published between 1970 and 2020. To create a comprehensive review of the CE domain, we conducted a keyword co-occurrence network analysis. We examined four distinct types of main paths using the main path analysis (MPA) technique: forward, backward, global, and key-route. According to the analyses, CE research focuses on six primary research themes: CE and sustainability, bioeconomy, CE practices, lifecycle assessment and industrial symbiosis, construction activities, and waste management. In addition, the MPA demonstrates that the CE literature has recently focused on Industry 4.0 technologies and their contribution to CE. This is the first attempt to depict the genealogy of CE research so that scholars can comprehend the domain's evolutionary structure, identify hot topics, and capture the history, development status, and potential future directions of CE research.

Hybrid manufacturing-remanufacturing system of essential commodity in the context of COVID-19

Purpose

This paper aims to assess the feasibility of a hybrid manufacturing and remanufacturing system (HMRS) for essential commodities in the context of COVID-19. Specifically, it emphasises using HMRS based on costs associated with various manufacturing activities.

Design/methodology/approach

The combination of mathematical model and system dynamics is used to model the HMRS system. The model was tried on sanitiser bottle manufacturing to generalise the result.

Findings

The remanufacturing cost is higher because of reverse logistics, inspection and holding costs. Ultimately remanufacturing costs turn out to be lesser than the original manufacturing the moment system attains stability.

Practical implications

The study put forth the reason to encourage remanufacturing towards sustainability through government incentives.

Originality/value

The study put forth the feasibility of the HMRS system for an essential commodity in the context of a covid pandemic. The research implemented system dynamics for modelling and validation.

Undergraduate perceptions on transitioning into E-learning for continuation of higher education during the COVID pandemic in a developing country: a cross-sectional study from Sri Lanka

BACKGROUND

The higher education was significantly influenced by the COVID pandemic within many developing countries, including Sri Lanka, necessitating to adopt more E-Learning opportunities. Therefore, this study was conducted to characterize the perceptions of Sri Lankan undergraduates to accept E-Learning in higher education, during the COVID crisis.

METHOD

A total of 657 randomly selected undergraduates of three state universities in Sri Lanka, were recruited as the study population. Information on Socio-demographic factors, Knowledge, Attitudes and Practices on E-Learning methods were acquired using an interviewer administered questionnaire. A Probit regression model was fitted to identify the driving factors for the willingness of undergraduates to engage in E-Learning.

RESULTS

Around, 80.2% of the respondents were females. Majority were residing in semi-urban areas (44.7%), followed by rural areas (39.9%). More than two third of the respondents were familiar with E-Learning and different Learning Management Systems (LMS) that facilitate E-Learning (68.9%). Majority of the respondents (73.7%) were using different E-Learning platforms, mostly 2 to 3 days per week (25.7%). Only around one third (36.4%) had received any formal training in using LMS or other E-Learning platforms. Smart phones (77.8%) were found to be the most preferred device used for E-Learning activities, followed by computers and laptops (21.3%). Meanwhile, LMS/MOODLE (45.4%), WhatsApp/Viber (33.0%) and Zoom (32.7%), were the most commonly used E-Learning platforms. The average acceptance of E-Learning methods was found to be 70.7% among Sri Lankan undergraduates during the COVID epidemic. Based on the Probit regression, nature of the residing locality (P=0.009), family income (P=0.048), academic field (P<0.001) and year (P=0.028), knowledge on Information and Communications Technology [ICT] (P=0.012), and previous training experiences on E-Learning (P<0.001) were found as significant drivers that influence the acceptance of E-Learning practices of the Sri Lankan undergraduates.

CONCLUSION

Adopting E-learning into higher education sector could be recognized as a viable solution to facilitate the higher education during a crisis like COVID. However, relevant authorities in Sri Lanka should take immediate actions to empower the physical resources for E-Learning, improve the basic telecommunication infrastructure and conduct appropriate training programmes to promote E-Learning among Sri Lankan undergraduates.

SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19 Research Trend during the First Two Years of the Pandemic in the United Arab Emirates: A PRISMA-Compliant Bibliometric Analysis

Scientific research is an integral part of fighting the COVID-19 pandemic. This bibliometric analysis describes the COVID-19 research productivity of the United Arab Emirates (UAE)-affiliated researchers during the first two years of the pandemic, 2020 to 2022. The Web of Science Core Collection (WoSCC) database was utilized to retrieve publications related to COVID-19 published by UAE-affiliated researcher(s). A total of 1008 publications met the inclusion criteria and were included in this bibliometric analysis. The most studied broad topics were general internal medicine (11.9%), public environmental occupational health (7.8%), pharmacology/pharmacy (6.3%), multidisciplinary sciences (5%), and infectious diseases (3.4%). About 67% were primary research articles, 16% were reviews, and the remaining were editorials letters (11.5%), meeting abstracts/proceedings papers (5%), and document corrections (0.4%). The University of Sharjah was the leading UAE-affiliated organization achieving 26.3% of the publications and funding 1.8% of the total 1008 published research. This study features the research trends in COVID-19 research affiliated with the UAE and shows the future directions. There was an observable nationally and international collaboration of the UAE-affiliated authors, particularly with researchers from the USA and England. This study highlights the need for in-depth systematic reviews addressing the specific COVID-19 research-related questions and studied populations.

The influences of the COVID-19 pandemic on sustainable consumption: an international study

Background

Sustainable production and consumption are two important issues, which mutually interact. Whereas individuals have little direct influence on the former, they can play a key role on the latter. This paper describes the subject matter of sustainable consumption and outlines its key features. It also describes some international initiatives in this field.

Results

By means of an international survey, the study explores the emphasis given to sustainable consumption during the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, and the degree of preparedness in individuals to engage in the purchase of green and sustainably manufactured products. The main results indicate that the pandemic offered an opportunity to promote sustainable consumption; nevertheless, the pandemic alone cannot be regarded as a 'game changer' in this topic.

Conclusions

Apart from an online survey with responses from 31 countries, which makes it one of the most representative studies on the topic, a logit model was used to analyse the main variables that affect the probability of pro-environmental consumption behaviour because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The paper lists some of the technological and social innovations that may be needed, so as to guide more sustainable consumption patterns in a post-pandemic world.

Promoting sustainable packaging applications in the circular economy by exploring and advancing molded pulp materials for food products: a review

Packaging ensures the safe handling and distribution of fresh and processed food products via diverse supply chains, and has become an indispensable component of the food industry. However, the rapidly expanding use of plastics, especially single-use plastics, as packaging material leads to inadequate waste management, littering, and consequently serious environmental damage, which predominantly affects marine and freshwater sources. Thus, the use of plastics for packaging purposes has become a major public concern and hence a concern among global policymakers. Notably, 26% of the total volume of global plastic production is primarily used for packaging, of which single-use plastics account for 50%, resulting in pollution that may last hundreds of years. This review provides an overview of the manner in which molded pulp products can be utilized to improve sustainability of food packaging applications, by highlighting the manufacturing processes, signifying characteristics features of recyclable molded pulp, and coupling circularity with eco-friendly and safe food product packaging. In this regard, current concepts advocate the implementation of a dynamic and sustainable approach using molded pulp products. This approach encompasses the design and production of eco-friendly packaging, distribution and consumption of packaged products, and collection and recycling of used packaging for subsequent reuse.

Atomic-Resolution Structure of SARS-CoV-2 Nucleocapsid Protein N-Terminal Domain

The nucleocapsid (N) protein is one of the four structural proteins of the SARS-CoV-2 virus and plays a crucial role in viral genome organization and, hence, replication and pathogenicity. The N-terminal domain (NNTD) binds to the genomic RNA and thus comprises a potential target for inhibitor and vaccine development. We determined the atomic-resolution structure of crystalline NNTD by integrating solid-state magic angle spinning (MAS) NMR and X-ray diffraction. Our combined approach provides atomic details of protein packing interfaces as well as information about flexible regions as the N- and C-termini and the functionally important RNA binding, β-hairpin loop. In addition, ultrafast (100 kHz) MAS 1H-detected experiments permitted the assignment of side-chain proton chemical shifts not available by other means. The present structure offers guidance for designing therapeutic interventions against the SARS-CoV-2 infection.

Occupational Safety Analysis for COVID-Instigated Repurposed Manufacturing Lines: Use of Nanomaterials in Injection Moulding

The COVID-19 pandemic instigated massive production of critical medical supplies and personal protective equipment. Injection moulding (IM) is considered the most prominent thermoplastic part manufacturing technique, offering the use of a large variety of feedstocks and rapid production capacity. Within the context of the European Commission-funded imPURE project, the benefits of IM have been exploited in repurposed IM lines to accommodate the use of nanocomposites and introduce the unique properties of nanomaterials. However, these amendments in the manufacturing lines highlighted the need for targeted and thorough occupational risk analysis due to the potential exposure of workers to airborne nanomaterials and fumes, as well as the introduction of additional occupational hazards. In this work, a safety-oriented failure mode and effects analysis (FMEA) was implemented to evaluate the main hazards in repurposed IM lines using acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS) matrix and silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) as additives. Twenty-eight failure modes were identified, with the upper quartile including the seven failure modes presenting the highest risk priority numbers (RPN), signifying a need for immediate control action. Additionally, a nanosafety control-banding tool allowed hazard classification and the identification of control actions required for mitigation of occupation risks due to the released airborne silver nanoparticles.

Challenges for Corporate Reputation—Online Reputation Management in Times of Global Pandemic

The issue of corporate reputation management in the time of accelerated digitization has been a subject of research by academics and practitioners for more than a decade. The aim of this study was to provide an insight into the issue of reputation management in the Internet environment in the time of global pandemic. As for the structure of the research, the study mapped two horizons of events, the first one being the onset of the pandemic in the first half of 2020, and the second one the period of cancellation of antipandemic measures after 24 months. The research was localized in the market of Central Europe, specifically in the online market of the Slovak Republic. This market synthesized two important factors, namely the highly developmental nature and at the same time the increased degree of restraint it experienced during the two years of the pandemic. A sophisticated online reputation analysis (sentiment analysis, analysis of reputation determinants, and data synthesis through the TOR indicator) was performed on a significant sample of e-commerce representatives, the results of which provided relevant findings on reputational challenges and reputational threats. Based on the findings, it can be stated that the market has adapted relatively quickly to the changed conditions. The pandemic represented a market opportunity rather than an existential threat for the subjects examined. It also played the role of an imaginary accelerator in the evolutionary transition from offline to online.

COVID-19 vaccine-induced recovery and the implications of vaccine apartheid on the global tourism industry

According to United Nations, World Tourism Organization COVID-19 has had the most devastating impact on the entire global tourism value chain, which resulted in a 74% decline in international passenger arrival, a US$1.3 trillion loss in international tourism receipts, over the US $ 2trillion loss of global domestic product and placing between 100 and 120 million jobs at risk globally. While the initial impact of the pandemic was uniform across the world, the recovery was expected to be varied across the region due to inequitable access to the COVID-19 vaccine. This study seeks to examine the implications of vaccination inequity on tourism recovery in the global tourism market. The study uses secondary, archival data and harnesses the advantages of big data generated from online activities from tourists and tourism companies obtained from authoritative sources. The study found that inequitable access to vaccinations produced a skewed recovery favouring vaccinated regions concentrated in the developed world, leaving poor regions such as Africa behind. The robot system characterising the vaccine-induced recovery had also created a vaccine diplomatic nightmare that scuttled global tourism recovery efforts. To ensure sustainable recovery, there is a need to ensure global vaccination access by rechannelling some of the excess vaccines in developed countries to countries that needs them to ensure the opening up of the entire tourism global market and reduce vulnerabilities that are coming from COVID-19 variants, which poses a threat to the gains made from the current vaccination program. The study concludes that there will not be any meaningful economic recovery without a wholesale approach covering the entire global population.

Circular Economy Business Models: a Repertoire of Theoretical Relationships and a Research Agenda

The shift towards a more resource efficient circular economy has become a necessity in the wake of current ecological, economic and social sustainability challenges. Mirroring circular-related developments in policy and business quarters, the circular economy literature is growing as a distinct field of academic enquiry. Yet, the conceptual and theoretical foundations of circular economy thinking need consolidation. Drawing from strategic management, sustainability transitions and systems theories, this article establishes some theoretical anchoring for circular economy business models. It finds that circular business models contribute to an understanding of both competitive advantage and the systemic nature of business. It also develops a future agenda for management research at the interface between the circular economy and business models.

Validation of the Malay Version of the COVID-19 Anxiety Scale in Malaysia

Background

Malaysians are disillusioned with the increased number of COVID-19 infection cases and the prolonged lockdown period. As a result of COVID-19 mitigation measurements, Malaysians are experiencing emotional and psychological consequences such as anxiety. Thus, there is an urgent need to have an instrument that could serve as a tool to assess the psychological impact of COVID-19 among Malaysians rapidly.

Methods

This study aimed to adapt and validate the Malay version of the COVID-19 Anxiety Scale (M-CAS) among Malaysian adults. The back-to-back translation was done to produce a M-CAS. Following face validation, M-CAS was self-administered to 225 participants from Malaysia via an online survey. The participants also completed the Generalised Anxiety Disorder 7-item Scale (GAD-7), World Health Organization Quality of Life Scale, Abbreviated Version (WHOQOL-BREF) and the Fear of COVID-19 Scale (FCV-19S). Data analysis was conducted using Statistical Package for the Social Sciences and Analysis of a Moment Structures. The psychometric properties of the M-CAS were examined via Cronbach alpha and confirmatory factor analysis. M-CAS scores were compared with the other tools to provide external validity.

Results

The statistical analysis revealed that the M-CAS demonstrated adequate internal consistency (Cronbach's alpha = 0.890) and presented with a unidimensional factor structure. M-CAS scores were strongly correlated with GAD-7 (r = 0.511, P < 0.001) and FCV-19S (r = 0.652, P < 0.001). Lack of correlation between M-CAS and WHOQOL-BREF showed that M-CAS scores did not reflect perceived quality of life.

Conclusion

The M-CAS is a valid and reliable tool in the Malay language that can be self-administered among Malaysians to assess anxiety levels induced by COVID-19. The M-CAS has only 7 items and utilised little time in real-life clinical practice.

Present and prospective research themes for tourism and hospitality education post-COVID19: A bibliometric analysis

Academic research in tourism and hospitality sector adds value directly to the way the industry grows and develops. Scholars in this area struggle with the pressures to publish in high ranking journals. The present study attempts to help doctoral students and tourism educators in identifying emerging themes in the tourism and hospitality arising out after COVID-19 pandemic. Using bibliometric analysis, five broad areas of emerging research themes are identified. Such research would further help managers, tourism related state administrators, and firm owners to recover from the devastating impact of COVID-19 on the industry across the world.

Achievement of Sustainable Development Goals through the Implementation of Circular Economy and Developing Regional Cooperation

Circular economy is a tool based on the inclusion of environmental, social, and governance performance (ESG) in decision-making to achieve sustainable development goals (SDG). In recent years, it has become clear that business-as-usual has nothing to do with sustainability, and alternative business models, primarily on technological grounds, must be implemented to mitigate the damage caused by significant and unpredictable effects of climate change. The current situation requires unprecedented and urgent changes to policies and business development models. The current research aimed to target on industrial symbiosis as one of the business models of the circular economy. It evaluated the benefits of symbiosis and the fostering of cooperation between industries and, consequently, has a major impact on resource efficiency ratios. The research is based on quantitative and qualitative research methods, including a literature review, assessment, and application of the triangulation method. As a result of this research, the authors realized a matrix for the development of regional or cross-country industrial symbiosis that can be used by policymakers to foster the development of symbiotic interconnections on a wide scale. The authors also recommend the development of the Baltic University Program (BUP) network center of excellence and methodological justification for industries to engage in industrial symbiosis (IS).

Supply chain disruption during the COVID-19 pandemic: Recognizing potential disruption management strategies

The COVID-19 pandemic has made a significant impact on various supply chains (SCs). All around the world, the COVID-19 pandemic affects different dimensions of SCs, including but not limited to finance, lead time, demand changes, and production performance. There is an urgent need to respond to this grand challenge. The catastrophic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic prompted scholars to develop innovative SC disruption management strategies and disseminate them via numerous scientific articles. However, there is still a lack of systematic literature survey studies that aim to identify promising SC disruption management strategies through the bibliometric, network, and thematic analyses. In order to address this drawback, this study presents a set of up-to-date bibliometric, network, and thematic analyses to identify the influential contributors, main research streams, and disruption management strategies related to the SC performance under the COVID-19 settings. The conducted analyses reveal that resilience and sustainability are the primary SC topics. Furthermore, the major research themes are found to be food, health-related SCs, and technology-aided tools (e.g., artificial intelligence (AI), internet of things (IoT), and blockchains). Various disruption management strategies focusing on resilience and sustainability themes are extracted from the most influential studies that were identified as a part of this work. In addition, we draw some managerial insights to ensure a resilient and sustainable supply of critical products in the event of a pandemic, such as personal protective equipment (PPE) and vaccines.

Assessment of COVID-19 Vaccine Acceptance and Reluctance Among Staff Working in Public Healthcare Settings of Saudi Arabia: A Multicenter Study

Objective

The study aimed to evaluate the novel coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccination acceptance and reluctance among staff working in Saudi healthcare facilities.

Methods

A cross-sectional study was conducted during April - May 2021, among healthcare workers in five public hospitals under the National Guards Health Association located in Alahsa, Dammam, Jeddah, Madinah, and Riyadh. The study used a questionnaire in English language, which was distributed through official email communication among healthcare staff currently working at study venues. The data was analyzed using IBM SPSS v23. An ethical approval was obtained.

Results

A total of 1,031 responses were recorded. Most of the staff had both doses of COVID-19 vaccine (89%). The mean score for vaccine acceptance on a scale of 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree) was 3.55 ± 1.6. The mean score for vaccine reluctance on the same scale was 2.71 ± 1.05. Most participants mentioned safety (76.9%) and efficacy (56.3%) as vaccine concerns and believed that COVID-19 vaccine may not be effective because of changes in virus strain (55.5%). The variables of gender and nationality significantly affected vaccine acceptance, while age, gender, nationality, and profession significantly affected vaccine reluctance (p < 0.05).

Conclusion

Most healthcare staff were vaccinated, and a high acceptance for COVID-19 vaccination was reported. Several demographic factors affected the vaccine acceptance and reluctance.

The future of industry 4.0 and the circular economy in Chinese supply chain: In the Era of post-COVID-19 pandemic

The demand for new productive factors is increasingly required, exacerbated in a scenario in which a linear economy prevails. The circular economy (CE) adoption is a proposal to guarantee environmental sustainability and redirect an obsolete process such as the linear economy. Thus, one of the main factors that allow achieving sustainability is Industry 4.0 (I4.0). In addition, the research aims to evaluate the role of I4.0 during the COVID-19 pandemic in China. The literature review process defines ten future projections with potential for the CE's adoption. The two-round Delphi approach was developed with 54 CE experts to evaluate the projections. In both rounds, the probability of occurrence up to 2030, its impact on the CE and its desirability were evaluated. Likewise, the qualitative criteria of the experts were coded to evaluate the projections. From the ten projections, four are those with the highest probability of occurrence (EP > 70%), with high impact (I > 3.5) and desirability of occurrence (I > 3.5). Expert evaluations make it possible to identify that Industry 4.0 and the digital skills of workers, their financing, and the efficiency of Government policies have a high probability of occurrence in the adoption of the CE in 2030. This research responds to the special call of papers providing evidence favouring the implementation of I4.0 in the CE from a holistic approach to draw a roadmap towards adopting the CE practices.

Adoption of technological innovation and recycling practices in automobile sector: under the Covid-19 pandemic

Rising environmental concerns and globalization of supply chain made their control and management difficult. Blockchain technology, as a distributed digital ledger technology, guarantees security, visibility, traceability, and transparency promises ease for environmental and global supply chain problems. In this research work, blockchain technology and business analytics techniques were critically analyzed in the context of supply chain. Global and local governmental bodies, consumers, and communities are putting pressure to meet sustainability goals, which prompts us to investigate how these technologies can address and aid remanufacturing and recycling practices and sustainability in supply chain. The results illustrate that advanced technologies have a key role in the implementation of remanufacturing and recycling practices. The results also indicate that the remanufacturing and recycling practices substantially improve automobile firm performance. Moreover, the results also indicated that Covid-19 pandemic has positive moderating effect between advanced technology and remanufacturing and recycling practices while having insignificant effect between remanufacturing and recycling practices and automobile firm performance.

Digital technologies and circular economy in supply chain management: in the era of COVID-19 pandemic

This empirical study aims to identify the importance of Digital Technologies (DT) as an enabler in the Circular Economy (C.E.) based business model, especially during Covid-19. The concept of 'circular economy' has now been advocated as a methodology to stimulate economic growth in line with the environmental sustainability. Hence, the practices of recycling, reduction, reuse/re-manufacture, and repairing (4R's) are deemed to be the core of a circular economy. Recently, the advent of the pandemic Covid-19 has forced the nations of the world to resort to alternate resource use in their manufacturing and trading of goods and services as the supply chains have almost remained disrupted since Covid-19 appeared. We investigate the impacts of Covid-19 upon the use of technological innovation (T.I.), circular economy practices (CEP), and organizational performance (ORP) incorporating the Structural Equation Modeling (SEM). Our results show that Covid-19 significantly impacted the adoption of technological innovation, circular economy, which leads toward organizational performance. Moreover, the practices and operations under the circular economy framework also appear to influence organizational performance significantly. Our study findings bring forward meaningful insights into improving CEF-cum-technology based practices in developing and emerging markets in Asia, and convey significant implications for the business community, policymakers, and researchers.

Circular economy and zero-carbon strategies between Japan and South Korea: A comparative study

The global population is increasing, as is the demand for basic materials. At the same time, key resources are in short supply, and the extraction and use of raw materials have major environmental implications, for instance, increased CO₂ emission. In a Circular Economy (CE), resources and products are divided, leased, reused, repaired, refurbished, and recycled, extending product life cycles, reducing waste, and generating additional value. Government entities in Japan and South Korea are designing and implementing policies to facilitate the transition to a CE and achieve carbon neutrality. The paper compares Japanese policies and actions with those of South Korea, identifies challenges and options for improvements in each country, and lessons that they can share. The paper reviews CE and low carbon policies in the two countries and compares how those, but also public interest and initiatives differ between them. It provides recommendations to address observed shortcomings and capture opportunities to connect CE and zero-carbon strategies. The article is expected to interest Japanese and South Korean policy-makers, companies, and academics.

The COVID-19 pandemic in the African continent

In December 2019, a new coronavirus, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) and associated disease, coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), was identified in China. This virus spread quickly and in March, 2020, it was declared a pandemic. Scientists predicted the worst scenario to occur in Africa since it was the least developed of the continents in terms of human development index, lagged behind others in achievement of the United Nations sustainable development goals (SDGs), has inadequate resources for provision of social services, and has many fragile states. In addition, there were relatively few research reporting findings on COVID-19 in Africa. On the contrary, the more developed countries reported higher disease incidences and mortality rates. However, for Africa, the earlier predictions and modelling into COVID-19 incidence and mortality did not fit into the reality. Therefore, the main objective of this forum is to bring together infectious diseases and public health experts to give an overview of COVID-19 in Africa and share their thoughts and opinions on why Africa behaved the way it did. Furthermore, the experts highlight what needs to be done to support Africa to consolidate the status quo and overcome the negative effects of COVID-19 so as to accelerate attainment of the SDGs.

Analysis of the COVID-19 pandemic’s impacts on manufacturing: a systematic literature review and future research agenda

The COVID-19 pandemic has affected manufacturing companies and necessitated adaptations of firms’ operations. Despite the increasing interest in this subject, a scarcity of systematic analysis can be observed. The present study systematically reviews the existing research on the COVID-19 pandemic concerning the manufacturing industry. This paper aims to highlight the main impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on the manufacturing sector from the operations management perspective, the practical adaptation actions, and future research opportunities. Open research questions and directions for further investigation are articulated and triangulated across organisational, process and technology perspectives.

OTT platforms resilience to COVID-19 – a study of business strategies and consumer media consumption in India

Purpose

COVID-19 preventive measures disrupted the media and entertainment business ecosystem, increased over the top (OTT) consumption, brought new OTT players, thus increased competition, and shaped consumer behaviour and habits. Despite this knowledge, in-depth insights into OTT's consumer behaviour, new usage habit and strategies used by subscription-based OTT platforms to maintain resilience during the COVID-19 pandemic are unknown. This paper aims to fill the two gaps in the extant OTT literature.

Design/methodology/approach

This study used Eisenhardt's multiple case studies approach to derive the strategies used by the top-performing subscription-based OTT platforms in India. Moreover, a purposive semi-structured Google survey was used to explore consumers' OTT experience during the pandemic. This study analysed data using NVivo 12 (survey) and MS Excel 2010 (case studies).

Findings

This study derived seven resilient OTT strategies; competitive low pricing, enhancing customer experience, launching innovative service plans, content localisation, strategic collaboration, flexibility in technology adoption and proactive sales promotion. Consequent to adopting these strategies, consumers' usage of OTT evolved from occasional to habitual. Convenience, ease of accessibility, risk of contracting COVID-19, variety and quality of content, online reviews and affordability drive consumer preference for OTT. Also, this study revealed consumers' varied OTT experiences.

Originality/value

The contribution is two-fold; the derived strategies for maintaining resilience and the in-depth insights into habit formation and consumer behaviour during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. This study is valuable for media and entertainment stakeholders like streaming service providers, OTT services, cable operators, etc.

Heavy Metal, Waste, COVID-19, and Rapid Industrialization in This Modern Era—Fit for Sustainable Future

Heavy metal contamination, waste, and COVID-19 are hazardous to all living things in the environment. This review examined the effects of heavy metals, waste, and COVID-19 on the ecosystem. Scientists and researchers are currently working on ways to extract valuable metals from waste and wastewater. We prefer Tessier sequential extraction for future use for heavy metal pollution in soil. Results indicated that population growth is another source of pollution in the environment. Heavy metal pollution wreaks havoc on soil and groundwater, especially in China. COVID-19 has pros and cons. The COVID-19 epidemic has reduced air pollution in China and caused a significant reduction in CO2 releases globally due to the lockdown but has a harmful effect on human health and the economy. Moreover, COVID-19 brings a huge amount of biomedical waste. COVID-19’s biomedical waste appears to be causing different health issues. On the other hand, it was discovered that recycling has become a new source of pollution in south China. Furthermore, heavy metal contamination is the most severe ecological effect. Likewise, every problem has a remedy to create new waste management and pollution monitoring policy. The construction of a modern recycling refinery is an important aspect of national waste disposal.

A Novel Multi-Criteria Assessment Approach for Post-COVID-19 Production Strategies in Vietnam Manufacturing Industry: OPA–Fuzzy EDAS Model

The global manufacturing supply chain has been disrupted by the negative impacts of the pandemic. In Southeast Asia, Vietnam’s manufacturing industry is one of the most strongly integrated with global and regional supply chains. The production strategies in the “new normal” are the key solution to the survival and sustainable development of manufacturers. This study aims to develop a two-stage framework to investigate the impacts of COVID-19 and the post-COVID-19 production strategies for Vietnam’s manufacturing industry. As a theoretical contribution, this study proposes a novel and robust integration approach, which combines the Ordinal Priority Approach (OPA) and Fuzzy Evaluation Based on Distance from Average Solution (Fuzzy EDAS), for the first time. The negative impacts of the pandemic were identified and weighted by the OPA method. Then, production strategies were comprehensively evaluated using the Fuzzy EDAS method. Findings indicate that digitization and on-site renewable energy are the most essential recovery strategies for manufacturing in Vietnam. These findings are validated by comparisons with the results of recent multiple criteria decision-making (MCDM) methods. Furthermore, weight sensitivity analysis reveals different suitability of strategies for short-term and long-term negative impacts. As a managerial implication, the multi-scenario ranking results help managers to make resource-allocation decisions for the implementation of post-COVID-19 production strategies.

Use of hyphenated analytical techniques to identify the bioactive constituents of Gunnera perpensa L., a South African medicinal plant, which potently inhibit SARS-CoV-2 spike glycoprotein-host ACE2 binding

SARS-CoV-2, the causative agent of COVID-19, continues to cause global morbidity and mortality despite the increasing availability of vaccines. Alongside vaccines, antivirals are urgently needed to combat SARS-CoV-2 infection and spread, particularly in resource-limited regions which lack access to existing therapeutics. Small molecules isolated from medicinal plants may be able to block cellular entry by SARS-CoV-2 by antagonising the interaction of the viral spike glycoprotein receptor-binding domain (RBD) with the host angiotensin-converting enzyme II (ACE2) receptor. As the medicinal plant Gunnera perpensa L. is being used by some South African traditional healers for SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19 management, we hypothesised that it may contain chemical constituents that inhibit the RBD-ACE2 interaction. Using a previously described AlphaScreen-based protein interaction assay, we show here that the DCM:MeOH extract of G. perpensa readily disrupts RBD (USA-WA1/2020)-ACE2 interactions with a half-maximal inhibition concentration (IC₅₀) of < 0.001 µg/mL, compared to an IC₅₀ of 0.025 µg/mL for the control neutralising antibody REGN10987. Employing hyphenated analytical techniques like UPLC-IMS-HRMS (method developed and validated as per the International Conference on Harmonization guidelines), we identified two ellagitannins, punicalin (2.12% w/w) and punicalagin (1.51% w/w), as plant constituents in the DCM:MeOH extract of G. perpensa which antagonised RBD-ACE2 binding with respective IC₅₀s of 9 and 29 nM. This good potency makes both compounds promising leads for development of future entry-based SARS-CoV-2 antivirals. The results also highlight the advantages of combining reverse pharmacology (based on medicinal plant use) with hyphenated analytical techniques to expedite identification of urgently needed antivirals.