No abstract

Shopping was once perceived as an activity of going out, exploring various stores and shops across the town, shifting through a myriad of options and finally settling down to purchase a product with full satisfaction. Now that the technology is skillfully trying to make a person think smartly, without exerting much physical energy, we see that even shopping has been engulfed under grip of changing lifestyle. With online shopping spreading its wings gradually, the experience of ‘touch and feel’ concept is slowly fading among the consumers. Online shopping or electronic shopping is a part of electronic commerce which allows consumers to directly buy goods or services from a seller over the internet. A survey was conducted in the Jorhat town of Assam to know the online shopping scenario among the consumers with the objective to identify the category of population inclined for online shopping and the factors influencing the consumers for online shopping. For the present research work, 120 samples were selected randomly from four wards of municipality area and a multistage stratified random sampling method was adopted in order to select representative sample. The findings of the study revealed that the young generations are very active in the activities of online shopping and most of them are females. The results of the study have given detailed information regarding the change in shopping behaviour of the consumers.

Extended-spectrum beta-lactamase (ESBL) producing Enterobacteriaceae has become a major threat globally. Here we have characterized ESBL producing E. coli and K. pneumoniae from various sources, studied antibiogram and resistance gene profiles. Out of 385 samples, 31 (8.05%) were positive for ESBL producing E. coli. Such isolates could be recovered from 10.05, 8.33, 15.63, 6.67 and 4.35 per cent of cattle milk, curd, chicken, pork and cattle faeces samples, respectively. A total of 59 (15.32%) samples were positive for ESBL producing K. pneumoniae, which were isolated from 14.35, 6.25, 21.43 and 34.78 per cent cattle milk, chicken, beef and cattle faeces, respectively. All the 90 isolates were confirmed as ESBL producers by CDT and ESBL-E strip tests. Antibiogram revealed that 74.19% and 69.49% of the ESBL producing E. coli and K. pneumoniae isolates, respectively showed resistance to ceftizoxime, 25.81% and 23.73% to both co-trimoxazole and tetracycline, 19.35% and 25.42% to ciprofloxacin, 9.68% and 16.95% to chloramphenicol, 3.23% and 5.08% to pipercillin-tazobactam, and 3.23% and 3.39% to gentamicin. Resistance gene profiling showed blaCTX-M gene as most predominant (100%). The blaTEM gene was found in 54.84% and 55.93%, blaSHV gene in 90.32% and 77.97%, Sul 1 gene in 90.32% and 86.44% of ESBL producing E. coli and K. pneumoniae isolates, respectively. The Int1 gene was detected in 70.97% and 62.71% isolates, while qnrB gene was found in 3.23% and 10.17% of E. coli and K. pneumoniae isolates, respectively.

A well structured interview schedule was administered on hundred rural households of eleven villages of Jorhat district of Assam during 2016-17 to conduct a survey specially on accumulation and utilization of agricultural wastes in rural households. Result indicated that majority of the farmers (30%) were of middle age group (30-40 years), mostly having a nuclear family (73%) with 1-5 members with an educational qualification upto 10 th standard. Majority of the respondents are marginal farmer with a land holding upto 10 acres and earn their livelihood primarily from farming. Most of the households cultivated paddy as monocrop. However, Rabi and Kharif vegetables were also grown by many households depending upon the land situation. Data reveals that 10,396 qt rice straw, 18,193 qt of rice husk, 2004.64 kg of water hyacinth and 12000 number of areca sheath are produced as agricultural wastes among the 100 households. The study also reveals that there is a huge gap between the availability of agricultural wastes and awareness for economic utilizing these wastes.

Listeria monocytogenes is an important foodborne pathogen which causes serious invasive illness, and affects mostly elderly and immune-compromised people, pregnant women, newborns and infants leading to listeriosis. L. monocytogenes can cause vast outbreaks due to consumption of contaminated food products, and has a significant role in public health. The pathogen has been isolated from food, human and animal samples world-wide. Neonatal listeriosis is most commonly reported incase of humans, where as in animal populations, spontaneous abortions, meningoencephalitis and endometritis are the most common. The purpose of this review is to enumerate Listeria epidemiology world-wide by using publicly available data from CDC, FDA and ProMED and by describing the details such as countries involved, source, suspected and confirmed case counts etc. to understand its public health importance. This review also offers a description of bacteriological characteristics, taxonomy, virulence determinants, typing methods, a detailed account of listeriosis in human and in animals and an up-to-date information of the recent outbreaks of L. monocytogenes. We specifically aimed at the prevalence and epidemiology of L. monocytogenes globally, since it is a major food-borne pathogen and is the third leading cause of death due to food poisoning. This review paper provides information on L. monocytogenes to understand the better management of the infection, the source of infection and route of transmission of the disease. Most of the listeriosis cases were linked with the consumption of contaminated food and it is important to identify the type of food materials to mitigate the risk of Listeriosis in the high-risk populations.