We explored acquired immunity resulting from vaccination in 3 to 7-year-old children, chronically exposed to multiple heavy metals and metalloids, in an e-waste recycling area (Guiyu, China). Child blood levels of ten heavy metals and metalloids, including lead (Pb), arsenic (As), mercury (Hg), chromium (Cr), cadmium (Cd), manganese (Mn), nickel (Ni), copper (Cu), zinc (Zn) and selenium (Se), and seven vaccine antibodies (diphtheria, pertussis, tetanus, hepatitis B, Japanese encephalitis, polio, measles) were measured. The exposed group had higher levels of blood Pb, Mn, Cu, Zn and Cr compared to the reference group (P < 0.05). Levels of all vaccine antibodies in the exposed group were significantly lower than in the reference group (P < 0.01). All vaccine antibodies negatively correlated with blood concentrations of Cu, Zn and Pb, based on spearman rank correlation analysis. Multiple logistic regression and univariate analyses identified the location of residence (Guiyu), high blood Pb (>10 μg/dL) and high blood Cu and Zn (upper median value of each group) to be inversely associated with seven antibody titers. Antibody titers increased with age, BMI, high blood Mn (>15 μg/L), and high blood Cd and Ni (upper median value of each group). Results suggest multiple heavy metal and metalloid exposure, especially to Pb, Zn and Cu, may be a risk factor inhibiting the development of child immunity, resulting in decreased child antibody levels against vaccines.

We studied neurodevelopment in infants from two communities. Children living in the vicinity of tin-ore kilns and smelters – TOKS; n = 51) were compared to children from a fishing village (Itapuã; n = 45). Mean hair-Hg (HHg) concentrations were significantly higher in Itapuã children which received significantly (p = 0.0000001) less mean ethylmercury (88.6 μg) from Thimerosal-containing vaccines (TCV) than the TOKS children (120 μg). Breast-milk Pb concentrations were significantly higher in the TOKS mothers (p = 0.000017; 10.04 vs. 3.9 μg L−1). Bayley mental development index (MDI) and psychomotor development index (PDI) were statistically significant (respectively p < 0.0000001, p = 0.000007) lower for the TOKS children only at 24 months of age. Multivariate regression analysis showed that MDI was negatively affected by breast-milk Pb and by HHg. PDI was positively affected by breastfeeding and negatively affected by ethylmercury. Milestone achievements were negatively affected by breast-milk Pb (age of walking) and by HHg (age of talking).

Vaccines are essential for children to defend against infection. Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) are emerging contaminants with the characteristics of persistence and bioaccumulation. PFAS exposure can affect the function of the nervous, endocrine, and immune system of animals and humans. We aimed to conduct a systematic review and meta-analysis of the epidemiological studies investigating potential relationships between PFAS exposure and vaccine antibody levels, and assessed whether PFAS would affect vaccine response in healthy children. A literature search was conducted in PubMed, Web of Science, and Scopus databases up to February 2022. We chose studies that measured serum vaccines antibodies and PFAS concentrations of the participants. Essential information, including mean difference of percentage change, regression coefficient, odds ratio, Spearman correlation coefficient, and 95% confidence intervals, were extracted from the selected studies to conduct descriptive analysis and meta-analysis where appropriate. The qualities of these studies were evaluated as well. Finally, nine epidemiological studies about children met our inclusion criteria. A high degree of heterogeneity is observed in terms of breastfeeding time, confounder control, and detection method. Exposure to perfluorooctanoic acid and perfluorohexane sulfonic acid is negatively associated with tetanus antibody level in children without heterogeneity by Cochran's Q test (p = 0.26; p = 0.55), and exposure to perfluorohexane sulfonate is negatively associated with tetanus antibody level but with heterogeneity (p = 0.04). This comprehensive review suggests that PFAS can have adverse health effects on children by hindering the production of vaccine antibodies. There are some consistent and negative associations between children exposure to certain PFAS and tetanus antibody level. The association of the other four vaccines (measles, rubella, mumps, and influenza) with PFAS remains uncertain, because very few studies are available. Further studies are needed to validate the possible associations.

COVID-19 can cause global pandemics; however, no specific vaccine has been recommended for COVID-19. Nearly 216 countries are trying to stop the spread of the disease, recover from it, and improve its mobility. In a way that people have not experienced in recent years, the COVID-19 pandemic affected humans through the year 2020. To stop the spread of the disease, many governments declared a complete lockdown.The nationwide lockdown had some positive effects on the environment even though it led to a decline in global economic growth. Air pollution levels reduced dramatically as a result of this lockdown on pollution. Most of Europe’s populated cities saw a reduction in NO2 concentration of 45–54%. COVID-19 and air, water, and ecology are connected via two pathways, one occurring before the spread of the disease and the other following after. As a result of industrial activity, transportation, and high human density, pollutants were high in many areas before the disease spread. There was a reduction in population movements as well as a decline in human activities which resulted in a reduction in carbon dioxide emissions, an improvement of the ozone layer, as well as improvements in the Earth’s weather and environment. As a result of a COVID-19 pandemic, human activities are negatively impacted, and the environment is positively affected. Our objective is to provide an assessment of the impact of human activities on the environment and ecology. During times of lockdown, there is a correlation between atmospheric changes and the behavior of natural creatures. Several significant findings are presented, including air pollution reduction, air quality improvement, ozone healing, and ecological sustainability. COVID-19 is beneficial for aerial health, aquatic health, and ecology in this paper.

Carbon emission from pig production is an issue of great importance owing to its effect on global warming. Differed from widespread large-scale pig farms in North America and Europe, small-scale and smallholder pig farms are mainly concentrated in China. However, information on carbon emissions from Chinese smallholder pig farms is limited. Additionally, large amounts of drugs and vaccines have been applied during smallholder pig production in China, yet their contribution to carbon emissions is unclear. Therefore, detailed dataset which records all inputs during a pig’s entire life cycle should be obtained, so as to accurately determine the magnitude of carbon emissions from Chinese smallholder pig farms. This study took Yancheng, eastern China, as an example and adopted the carbon footprint (CF), life cycle inventory (LCI), and Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) greenhouse gas (GHG) field calculations to accurately estimate the GHG emissions resulting from pig production of China. Furthermore, the contributions of vaccine application and other driving forces behind GHG emissions were identified using statistic methods. In the study area, the pig CFs in the nursery period, fattening period, and full life cycle were 5.83, 4.73, and 6.75 kg CO₂ eq·kg⁻¹ respectively. The CF of pig production in the study area varied from 4.74 to 9.48 kg CO₂ eq·kg⁻¹, with an average of 6.75 kg CO₂ eq·kg⁻¹; this average was, overall, higher than that of large-scale pig farms in North America and Europe. GHG emissions from manure (42.87%) and fodder (27.77%) were responsible for a large proportion of the total CF. Normal vaccine inputs contributed highly (15.33%) to the total CF. The contribution of vaccine application to the CF is roughly evaluated, suggesting it may be a potentially important source of GHG emissions in pig production and should receive more attention in the future. Furthermore, GHG emissions from smallholder pig production farms can be significantly reduced by developing a mixed crop-livestock system, increasing the application of organic fertilizers, and installing biogas digesters.

Safe and effective vaccines became an important preventive tool against novel corona virus disease infection. Physicians were prioritized for early vaccination since they are at higher risk for contagion of the infection and they might affect the general populations’ uptake of the vaccine. This study aimed to examine the acceptability of COVID-19 vaccines and the underpinnings of reluctance to uptake the vaccine among working physicians in Egypt. A cross-sectional study was conducted for 3 months, recruiting 1268 physicians using a snowballing random sampling technique. A self-administered electronic questionnaire was deployed to collect related data. Of participants, 24% expressed their acceptance towards COVID-19 vaccines, 39% would wait for further review, while 36.7% did not agree to get vaccinated. Findings revealed that 22% of them were vaccinated and the significant determinants of unacceptability included age, gender, higher educational attainments, prior infection, lack of direct patients’ contact, and working in rural health facilities (p < 0.05). The most common reasons beyond their reluctance were fear of the vaccines’ adverse effects and the short duration of its clinical trials (60% and 49.5%). Physicians had a low intention to receive COVID-19 vaccines particularly between females, senior staff, and those who had a low self-perceived risk for the infection. Integrated approaches should be designed to address concerns and factors associated with vaccine unacceptability to reduce vaccination reluctance between physicians, hence the general population.

We conducted the current analysis to determine the potential role of measles vaccination in the context of the spread of COVID-19. Data were extracted from the World Health Organization’s (WHO) Global Health Observatory data repository about the measles immunization coverage estimates and correlated to overall morbidity and mortality for COVID-19 among different countries. Data were statistically analyzed to calculate the Spearman rank correlation coefficient (rho). There was a significant positive correlation between the vaccine coverage (%) and new cases per one million populations (rho = 0.24; p-value = 0.025); however, this correlation was absent in deaths per one million populations (rho = 0.17; p-value = 0.124). On further analysis of the effect of first reported year of vaccination policy, there was no significant correlation with both of total cases per one million populations (rho = 0.11; p-value = 0.327) and deaths per one million populations (rho = −0.02; p-value = 0.829). Claims regarding the possible protective effect of measles vaccination seem to be doubtful.

The greatest challenge the world is facing today is to win the battle against COVID-19 pandemic as soon as possible. Until a vaccine is available, personal protection, social distancing, and disinfection are the main tools against SARS-CoV-2. Although it is quite infectious, the SARS-CoV-2 virus itself is an enveloped virus that is relatively fragile because its protective fatty layer is sensitive to heat, ultraviolet radiation, and certain chemicals. However, heat and liquid treatments can damage some materials, and ultraviolet light is not efficient in shaded areas, so other disinfection alternatives are required to allow safe re-utilization of materials and spaces. As of this writing, evidences are still accumulating for the use of ozone gas as a disinfectant for sanitary materials and ambient disinfection in indoor areas. This paper reviews the most relevant results of virus disinfection by the application of gaseous ozone. The review covers disinfection treatments of both air and surfaces carried out in different volumes, which varies from small boxes and controlled chambers to larger rooms, as a base to develop future ozone protocols against COVID-19. Published papers have been critically analyzed to evaluate trends in the required ozone dosages, as a function of relative humidity (RH), contact time, and viral strains. The data have been classified depending on the disinfection objective and the volume and type of the experimental set-up. Based on these data, conservative dosages and times to inactivate the SARS-CoV-2 are estimated. In small chambers, 10–20 mg ozone/m³ over 10 to 50 min can be sufficient to significantly reduce the virus load of personal protection equipment. In large rooms, 30 to 50 mg ozone/m³ would be required for treatments of 20–30 min. Maximum antiviral activity of ozone is achieved at high humidity, while the same ozone concentrations under low RH could result inefficient. At these ozone levels, safety protocols must be strictly followed. These data can be used for reducing significantly the viral load although for assuring a safe disinfection, the effective dosages under different conditions need to be confirmed with experimental data.

One of the important ways to the efficiently use of low-grade thermal energy is the adsorption refrigeration technology. However, it has some drawbacks such as low specific cooling power and coefficient of performance, especially under using the conventional adsorption pairs. Therefore, new adsorption pairs are tested in solar adsorption ice-maker and compared with other conventional pairs data from open literature to find the tendency of improving the solar adsorption ice-maker performance. The experimental test rig has been built in Upper Egypt in Qena City. Four different new adsorption pairs of granular activated carbon/R-410A, granular activated carbon/R-511A, Maxsorb III/R-410A, and Maxsorb III/R-511A are used. It is demonstrated that Maxsorb III/R-511A pair based solar adsorption ice-maker produced the highest values for specific cooling power, coefficient of performance, and ice production per 1 kg of adsorbent of approximately 226.7 W/kgₐdₛ, 0.197, and 1.96 kg/kgₐdₛ, respectively. While granular activated carbon/R-410A based solar adsorption ice-maker produced the lowest values of ice production per 1 kg of adsorbent and coefficient of performance of 1.38 kg/kgₐdₛ and 0.104, respectively. Moreover, it can be concluded that the tested pairs are feasible to be used in solar adsorption ice-maker systems, especially in such hot climate of Upper Egypt for food and vaccine preservation and storage.

Globally, vaccination plays a vital role in controlling the Covid-19 pandemic. However, the cold supply chain is essential for vaccine storage and logistics services. In a country like India, the last-mile logistics of vaccines is a challenging task. The cold chain is indispensable for the Covid-19 vaccine drive to the rural areas. The demand for cold storage increases rapidly due to the rapid Covid-19 vaccine drive. The conventional cold storage facility has a more significant threat to the grid power quality and environmental impacts. The energy demand and greenhouse gas emission of traditional cold storage lead to global warming. The micro cold storage facility has to be developed rapidly to accelerate the vaccine drive to the last mile of the county with reliable and affordable energy sources. In addition, climate change mitigation is ensured by the renewable energy utilization in the Covid-19 vaccine drive. The proposed novel micro cold storage aims to be silent, clean, mobile, without moving parts, and reliable for the last-mile vaccine logistics as a vaccine carrier to the remote rural areas. This paper deals with the novel design, development, and experimental investigation of solar photovoltaic powered thermoelectric-based micro cold storage as a Covid-19 vaccine carrier for rural areas. The design consideration of Covid-19 vaccine storage has been reported. The experimental results ensure the World Health Organization recommended vaccine storage (i.e., vaccine carrier) temperature range of +2 to +8 °C. Therefore, green energy and refrigeration system provide environmental sustainability by mitigating 700kg of annual carbon emission.