BackgroundThe Summit of Independent European Vaccination Experts (SIEVE) recommended in 2007 that efforts be made to improve healthcare workers’ knowledge and beliefs about vaccines, and their attitudes towards them, to increase vaccination coverage. The aim of the study was to compile and analyze the areas of disagreement in the existing evidence about the relationship between healthcare workers’ knowledge, beliefs and attitudes about vaccines and their intentions to vaccinate the populations they serve.MethodsWe conducted a systematic search in four electronic databases for studies published in any of seven different languages between February 1998 and June 2009. We included studies conducted in developed countries that used statistical methods to relate or associate the variables included in our research question. Two independent reviewers verified that the studies met the inclusion criteria, assessed the quality of the studies and extracted their relevant characteristics. The data were descriptively analyzed.ResultsOf the 2354 references identified in the initial search, 15 studies met the inclusion criteria. The diversity in the study designs and in the methods used to measure the variables made it impossible to integrate the results, and each study had to be assessed individually. All the studies found an association in the direction postulated by the SIEVE experts: among healthcare workers, higher awareness, beliefs that are more aligned with scientific evidence and more favorable attitudes toward vaccination were associated with greater intentions to vaccinate. All the studies included were cross-sectional; thus, no causal relationship between the variables was established.ConclusionThe results suggest that interventions aimed at improving healthcare workers’ knowledge, beliefs and attitudes about vaccines should be encouraged, and their impact on vaccination coverage should be assessed.

No abstract

Biofiltration, activated sludge diffusion, biotrickling filtration, chemical scrubbing, activated carbon adsorption, regenerative incineration, and a hybrid technology (biotrickling filtration coupled with carbon adsorption) are comparatively evaluated in terms of environmental performance, process economics, and social impact by using the IChemE Sustainability Metrics in the context of odor treatment from wastewater treatment plants (WWTP). This comparative analysis showed that physical/chemical technologies presented higher environmental impacts than their biological counterparts in terms of energy, material and reagents consumption, and hazardous-waste production. Among biological techniques, the main impact was caused by the high water consumption to maintain biological activity (although the use of secondary effluent water can reduce both this environmental impact and operating costs), biofiltration additionally exhibiting high land and material requirements. From a process economics viewpoint, technologies with the highest investments presented the lowest operating costs (biofiltration and biotrickling filtration), which suggested that the Net Present Value should be used as selection criterion. In addition, a significant effect of the economy of scale on the investment costs and odorant concentration on operating cost was observed. The social benefits derived from odor abatement were linked to nuisance reductions in the nearby population and improvements in occupational health within the WWTP, with the hybrid technology exhibiting the highest benefits. On the basis of their low environmental impact, high deodorization performance, and low Net Present Value, biotrickling filtration and AS diffusion emerged as the most promising technologies for odor treatment in WWTP.

No abstract

Today, methane (CH4), nitrous oxide (N2O), and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions represent approximately 98 % of the total greenhouse gas (GHG) inventory worldwide, and their share is expected to increase significantly in this twenty-first century. CO2 represents the most important GHG with approximately 77 % of the total GHG emissions (considering its global warming potential) worldwide, while CH4 and N2O are emitted to a lesser extent (14 and 8 %, respectively) but exhibit global warming potentials 23 and 298 times higher than that of CO2, respectively. Most members of the United Nations, based on the urgent need to maintain the global average temperature 2 °C above preindustrial levels, have committed themselves to significantly reduce their GHG emissions. In this context, an active abatement of these emissions will help to achieve these target emission cuts without compromising industrial growth. Nowadays, there are sufficient empirical evidence to support that biological technologies can become, if properly tailored, a low-cost and environmentally friendly alternative to physical/chemical methods for the abatement of GHGs. This study constitutes a state-of-the-art review of the microbiology (biochemistry, kinetics, and waste-to-value processes) and bioreactor technology of CH4, N2O, and CO2 abatement. The potential and limitations of biological GHG degradation processes are critically discussed, and the current knowledge gaps and technology niches in the field are identified.