Animal welfare has become more important as the consumer market is increasingly demanding good conditions of handling production animals, especially in swine farming. There is also scientific evidence of economic losses due to animal stress during growth and before slaughter, reducing body weight, carcass yield and meat quality. Thus, natural and economically viable therapeutic alternatives were researched, such as the use of herbal medicines, aiming to minimize these negative effects on animals. With emphasis on Lippia alba, a plant commonly used in Brazilian medicine with proven efficacy as a relaxant and antiparasitic, anti-inflammatory, anesthetic and anti-stress for most animal species. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of L. alba essential oil supplementation on the reduction of serum cortisol levels in growing pigs and as a welfare parameter to evaluate these animals. Twelve F1 castrated pigs with an average weight of 12.3 kg were divided into two groups of six animals. Control group (A1) received saline solution at a dose of 1 mL.kg-1 and treatment group (A2) 0.5% L. alba essential oil at a dose of 1 mL.kg-1 on days 0, 30, 60 and 90 by gavage. During these time points, blood was collected from the auricular vessel to measure cortisol levels using the radioimmunoassay technique (Kit Cort-CT2). The administration of L. alba essential oil showed a significant anti-stress effect in growing pigs, significantly decreasing blood cortisol levels, an indicator of animal welfare.

Objective: The objective of this study was to investigate the prevalence and carry out epidemiology using sociodemographic data from patients with symptoms suggestive of COVID-19 (SARS-CoV-2) in three bordering Brazilian municipalities. Methods: An epidemiological survey of positive cases of COVID-19 through RT-PCR was carried out in 1874 patients, seen in the Unified Health System (SUS), aged between 0-99 years, who had symptoms suggestive of COVID-19, from the cities of Assis Chateaubriand, Tupãssi, and Formosa do Oeste. Results: It was possible to observe that of the 1874 patients seen in the public health network of the three municipalities, 354 were diagnosed as positive. The predominance of cases was in female patients (51.97%) and in patients who lived in urban areas (93.50%), and the predominant age group was 20-29 years (19.78%). Conclusion: The result of this study demonstrated the epidemiological profile of patients with respiratory and flu-like symptoms, positive for COVID-19, in three municipalities bordering Paraguay and Argentina. It was evident that the age group has its specificities regarding the susceptibility of the infection. Although the borders are closed, there was probably a spread of the virus in this region, due to the diversion, which showed an increase during the pandemic period.

As doenças veiculadas por alimentos constituem um grave problema de saúde pública. Estimam-se que milhões de pessoas, em todo o mundo, são acometidas por doenças transmitidas por alimentos, e a maioria delas está ligada aos hábitos de higiene precários dos manipuladores, como higienização e controle ambiental de parasitas. Com isso, o objetivo deste estudo foi avaliar a prevalência de enteroparasitoses em manipuladores de alimentos das escolas públicas do município de Umuarama-PR e verificar possíveis associações da positividade para enteroparasitoses com variáveis socioeconômicas, comportamentais e ambientais. Participaram deste estudo 100 manipuladores de alimentos, todos do sexo feminino e com faixa etária entre 22 a 63 anos. Foram avaliados alguns aspectos socioeconômicos, que se relacionam com aspectos epidemiológicos das enteroparasitoses, como: faixa etária, sexo, renda familiar mensal, nível de escolaridade, número de pessoas residentes, condições de moradia, abastecimento de água, local das refeições, destino dos dejetos, instalações sanitárias, destino do lixo, hábito de ingerir frutas e verduras diariamente. No total das amostras estudadas, apenas 3% estavam parasitadas pelo protozoário, pertencendo à classe das Entamoebas, a Entamoeba coli. Apesar desta baixa frequência encontrada nesta pesquisa, ressalta-se a importância da educação sanitária como bons hábitos de higiene pessoal e de manipulação correta de alimentos, uma vez que podem ser transmitidos aos demais indivíduos, atuando desta forma na prevenção destas parasitoses e garantindo melhor qualidade de vida.