Many governments employed mandates for COVID-19 vaccines, imposing consequences upon unvaccinated people. Attitudes towards these policies have generally been positive, but little is known about how discourses around them changed as the characteristics of the disease and the vaccinations evolved. Western Australia (WA) employed sweeping COVID-19 vaccine mandates for employment and public spaces whilst the state was closed off from the rest of the country and world, and mostly with no COVID-19 in the community. This article analyses WA public attitudes during the mandate policy lifecycle from speculative to real. Qualitative interview data from 151 adults were analysed in NVivo 20 via a novel chronological analysis anchored in key policy phases: no vaccine mandates, key worker vaccine mandates, vaccine mandates covering 75% of the workforce and public space mandates. Participants justified mandates as essential for border reopening and, less frequently, for goals such as protecting the health system. However, public discourse focusing on ‘getting coverage rates up’ may prove counter-productive for building support for vaccination; governments should reinforce end goals in public messaging (reducing suffering and saving lives) because such messaging is likely to be more meaningful to vaccination behaviour in the longer term.

Some serology assays demonstrated useful for post-treatment monitoring of Strongyloides stercoralis infection. Serology frequently has low specificity, which might be improved by the use of recombinant antigens. The Strongy Detect ELISA is based on 2 recombinant antigens (SsIR and NIE) and proved good accuracy. Aim of this study was to evaluate the performance of this test for the post-treatment monitoring of strongyloidiasis. We tested 38 paired sera, with matched fecal tests results, stored in our biobank and originating from a randomized controlled trial. At baseline, all patients tested positive for at least 1 fecal assay among PCR, direct stool microscopy and agar plate culture. Patients were re-tested with both serology and fecal assays 12 months after treatment. Primary outcome was the relative reduction in optical density (OD) between baseline and follow up. We observed that about 95% samples showed a reduction between pre and post-treatment OD, with a median relative reduction of 93.9% (IQR 77.3%–98.1%). In conclusion, the test proved reliable for post-treatment monitoring. However, some technical issues, including that the threshold for positivity has not be predefined, and that a substantial number of samples showed overflow signals, need to be fixed to permit use in routine practice.

In an era of global sanitary, economic and ecological crisis, beliefs in the predictive power of artificial intelligence (AI) progressively penetrate the legal and political spheres, in search of new ways to anticipate and govern the future. In this context, it is critical to understand the idiosyncratic nature of the interplay between governance and algorithmic logics of prediction. This contribution discusses how the association between governance and AI makes the future knowable in the present and shapes a programmatic way of formalising, justifying and deploying action in the here and now. We focus on three principles of institutional mobilisation in the face of uncertainty and indeterminacy: precaution, pre-emption and preparedness, each of which is affected by the use of AI relying on so-called ‘real-time predictions’. Drawing from risk theory and Science and Technology Studies, we argue that the current convergence between AI and governance is shaping a new sociotechnical imaginary, promoting a distinctive conception of life and of the future in the age of the Anthropocene.

The impact of ‘bad’ science on judicial decision-making is a thorny aspect of the relationship between science and law. This study employs doctrinal and empirical analysis to explore two Italian judgments that asserted a causal link between childhood vaccines and autism. Using a combination of actor–network theory and legal pragmatism, we uncovered a network of actors and institutions internal and external to the legal system enabling these impactful decisions that went on to contribute to a crisis in vaccination coverage in Italy. These include trial strategies, resources, communication practices between arms of government, awareness and responsiveness of institutional actors, and institutional mechanisms governing the integration of scientific expertise into the legal process. By forensically analysing how a ‘zombie idea’ received a patent of legitimacy in the Italian context, this study provides useful lessons for legal systems grappling with complex and contested public health matters.

Bergamo province was badly hit by the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) epidemic. We organised a public-funded, multidisciplinary follow-up programme for COVID-19 patients discharged from the emergency department or from the inpatient wards of ‘Papa Giovanni XXIII’ Hospital, the largest public hospital in the area. As of 31 July, the first 767 patients had completed the first post-discharge multidisciplinary assessment. Patients entered our programme at a median time of 81 days after discharge. Among them, 51.4% still complained of symptoms, most commonly fatigue and exertional dyspnoea, and 30.5% were still experiencing post-traumatic psychological consequences. Impaired lung diffusion was found in 19%. Seventeen per cent had D-dimer values two times above the threshold for diagnosis of pulmonary embolism (two unexpected and clinically silent pulmonary thrombosis were discovered by investigating striking D-dimer elevation). Survivors of COVID-19 exhibit a complex array of symptoms, whose common underlying pathology, if any, has still to be elucidated: a multidisciplinary approach is fundamental, to address the different problems and to look for effective solutions.

This opinion piece puts forward a critique of the policy and regulatory frameworks governing vaccines, understood as tools to confront pandemic and epidemic diseases (PEDs). Vaccines being the universally recognised prime method of prevention, immunisation campaigns and vaccine research and development (R&D) could reasonably be expected to feature prominently in any policy and/or strategic document addressing emerging health threats. Yet, vaccination occupies a relatively subsidiary role, with a prevalent focus on risk management mechanisms. This piece outlines the main characteristics of preparedness frameworks and looks at vaccine development in the course of PED outbreaks in the recent past, concluding that the COVID-19 pandemic calls for a paradigm shift in vaccine R&D, which should become integral to public health preparedness.

The EU is continuously developing strategies, policies and regulations to confront pandemic and epidemic diseases. The actions of the EU in this field do not happen in a vacuum but are instead embedded in a complex international and transnational network. This article suggests the existence of a tension between public health policy and a twofold set of competing considerations: growing security concerns and market pressures. To structure the argument the article examines three distinct but related aspects: first, it clarifies the different levels of decision-making impacting on the EU’s policy and regulation of vaccines for PEDs: these levels are described as international, transnational and domestic, and the key players involved at each level are also identified; second, it analyses levels of responsiveness to and preparedness for outbreaks and analyses how past experiences have oriented the policy debate; third, it discusses issues of accountability of vaccine developers, authorising authorities and rule-makers involved in preparedness and response to emerging PEDs.

The leak of confidential documents on 2 May 2016 by GreenpeaceNetherlands allows some preliminary conclusions on both the scope and success of the negotiations so far. As regards the pharmaceuticalmarket, the current state of affairs combines the promise of steps forward with the prospect of concerning standstills. This short opinion follows key points emerging from the leaked documents n.9 (“RegulatoryCooperation”) andn.16 (“TacticalState ofPlay”) that are directly relevant to the pharmaceutical market. The themes that will be briefly discussed are, first, the regulatory cooperation mechanisms emerging fromdoc. n.9 in comparison to current cooperation processes in pharmaceutical regulation. The leaked papers suggest positive and commendable (yet far from conclusive) developments towards amore transparent and regulated framework for cooperation, while perpetuating concerns regarding fundamental policy choices and prevalence ofmercantile imperatives over competing public interests.

A significant reform is currently under the scrutiny of EU institutions in the field of pharmaceutical risk regulation. With its proposal dated July 17th 2012, the Commission seeks to modernise the legal framework of clinical trials by addressing a series of shortcomings ascribed to the current regime governed by Directive 2001/20/EC (to be repealed by the new legislation). The iter of the reform is proving to be complex and lengthy, the first vote having been delayed to March 2014.While a comprehensive account of such a detailed proposal would defeat the scope of this short report, the analysis will focus on some of the most salient features of the proposed regulation, and attempt to situate them in the international context of pharmaceutical regulation.

We present the first results of a comprehensive HST study of the star-formation history of Fornax dSph, based on WFPC2 imaging of 7 Fornax fields. Our observations reach the oldest main-sequence turnoffs, allowing us to address fundamental questions of dwarf galaxy evolution, such as the spatial variations in the stellar content, and whether the old stellar population is made up of stars formed in a very early burst or the result of a more continuous star formation.

The effect of root-released compounds of transplastomic tobacco (Nicotiana tabacum) on the soil bacterial community structure, and their potential to support horizontal gene transfer (HGT) to bacteria have been studied. Soil microcosms were exposed to root-released compounds collected from transplastomic and non-transgenic tobacco cultivars. Cluster analysis of automated ribosomal intergenic spacer analysis (ARISA) profiles of the soil bacterial community after 48 h incubation grouped the transgenic cultivar apart from the non-transgenic, indicating that it had a rhizodeposition pattern different from the parental plants. However, these differences were less than between the two non-transgenic tobacco cultivars studied. NMR characterization of the root-released compounds showed some differences in chemical fingerprinting pattern between the transplastomic and the parental cultivar. However, the effect on bacterial community structure was transient, and tended to disappear after 96 h of incubation. The potential of root-released compounds as a source of transforming DNA for bacteria was investigated by using four potential recipient species. No transformants were obtained following exposure of all the recipients to the root-released compounds. Root-released compounds amended to transgene donor DNA decreased the transformation frequency of Acinetobacter baylyi strain ADP1200, while Azospirillum, Agrobacterium, and Sinorhizobium strains failed to develop competence also in the presence of an external added transgene source. Detection of plastid sequences by PCR suggested that a very low amount of fragmented plastid donor DNA was present in the root-released compounds.