Background: The 2019 Coronavirus infection (COVID-19) caused by a novel strain of coronavirus was detected in China in December 2019, and declared a public health emergency of international concern on January 30, 2020. Community pharmacists have an important role in supporting the local health emergency preparedness and response arrangements. Objectives: To investigate pharmacists and pharmacy students' awareness and source of their information regard the management of the coronavirus pandemic, and their perspective of their role during this emergent situation. Methods: This descriptive cross-sectional online survey study was conducted in Jordan during the COVID-19 outbreak (from 15 to 30 March 2020). A validated online questionnaire addressing participants' current awareness about epidemics/pandemics and COVID-19, source of information and their perspectives of their role. Data were analyzed using statistical package for social science (SPSS). Results: Participants (n = 726) had a mean age of 26.9 (8.0) years with 71.9% females. Pharmacy students made 35.3% of the sample while the rest were pharmacists. Only 54.3% of participants believed that they got enough education about epidemics/pandemics, and 94.6% of them follow on the latest coronavirus updates on treatments, and that is mainly from the media (59.5%) followed by the World Health Organization reports (58.7%) and then the published researches (57%). Awareness score (out of 20) of pharmacists (n = 470) was significantly higher (p < 0.001) than that of students (n = 256). Better Awareness scores were also associated with higher age of participants, graduating from a public versus a private university, and attending more educational workshops. Conclusion: The majority of pharmacists and pharmacy students reported that they have a major role in the management of epidemics/pandemics through the community pharmacies but the majority follow on the latest coronavirus updates from the media. This fact rings bills considering the numerous conflicting messages publicized during the pandemic through the media. the World Health Organization (WHO) and CDC declared the coronavirus infectious disease (coronavirus disease 2019, termed COVID-19) 2,3 as a pandemic caused by a newly discovered coronavirus strain named 'severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2' or SARS CoV-2, colloquially referred to as COVID-19. 2,3 Coronavirus (COVID-19) belong to a family of RNA-viruses which take humans and mammals as formal hosts to live and replicate. 4 COVID-19 has been reported as an extraordinarily contagious virus. 5 People who get infected with this virus experience mild to moderate

The COVID-19 pandemic has struck many countries globally. Jordan has implemented strict nationwide control measures to halt the viral spread, one of which was the closure of universities and shifting to remote teaching. The impact of this pandemic could extend beyond the risk of physical harm to substantial psychological consequences. Our study aimed at assessing 1) psychological status, 2) challenges of distance teaching, and 3) coping activities and pandemic-related concerns among university teachers in Jordan in the midst of COVID-19-related quarantine and control measures. We conducted a cross-sectional study using an anonymous online survey. The measure of psychological distress was obtained using a validated Arabic version of the Kessler Distress Scale (K10). Other information collected included sociodemographic profile, methods used to handle distress, motivation to participate in distance teaching, and challenges of distance teaching as well as the most worrisome issues during this pandemic. Three hundred eighty-two university teachers returned completed surveys. Results of K10 showed that 31.4% of respondents had severe distress and 38.2% had mild to moderate distress. Whereas gender was not associated with distress severity, age had a weak negative correlation (Rho = −0.19, P < 0.0001). Interestingly, most teachers had moderate to high motivation for distance teaching. Engagement with family was the most reported self-coping activity. More than half of the participants were most concerned and fearful about SARS-CoV-2 infection. In conclusion, university teachers have shown to exhibit various levels of psychological distress and challenges during the implementation of precautionary national measures in the battle against COVID-19 in Jordan.

Background: Being on the verge of a revolutionary approach to gathering information, ChatGPT (an artificial intelligence (AI)-based language model developed by OpenAI, and capable of producing human-like text) could be the prime motive of a paradigm shift on how humans will acquire information. Despite the concerns related to the use of such a promising tool in relation to the future of the quality of education, this technology will soon be incorporated into web search engines mandating the need to evaluate the output of such a tool. Previous studies showed that dependence on some sources of online information (e.g., social media platforms) was associated with higher rates of vaccination hesitancy. Therefore, the aim of the current study was to describe the output of ChatGPT regarding coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccine conspiracy beliefs. and compulsory vaccination. Methods: The current descriptive study was conducted on January 14, 2023 using the ChatGPT from OpenAI (OpenAI, L.L.C., San Francisco, CA, USA). The output was evaluated by two authors and the degree of agreement regarding the correctness, clarity, conciseness, and bias was evaluated using Cohen’s kappa. Results: The ChatGPT responses were dismissive of conspiratorial ideas about severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) origins labeling it as non-credible and lacking scientific evidence. Additionally, ChatGPT responses were totally against COVID-19 vaccine conspiracy statements. Regarding compulsory vaccination, ChatGPT responses were neutral citing the following as advantages of this strategy: protecting public health, maintaining herd immunity, reducing the spread of disease, cost-effectiveness, and legal obligation, and on the other hand, it cited the following as disadvantages of compulsory vaccination: ethical and legal concerns, mistrust and resistance, logistical challenges, and limited resources and knowledge. Conclusions: The current study showed that ChatGPT could be a source of information to challenge COVID-19 vaccine conspiracies. For compulsory vaccination, ChatGPT resonated with the divided opinion in the scientific community toward such a strategy; nevertheless, it detailed the pros and cons of this approach. As it currently stands, the judicious use of ChatGPT could be utilized as a user-friendly source of COVID-19 vaccine information that could challenge conspiracy ideas with clear, concise, and non-biased content. However, ChatGPT content cannot be used as an alternative to the original reliable sources of vaccine information (e.g., the World Health Organization [WHO] and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC]).

Since its public release in November 2022, ChatGPT has gained a widespread attention and  received mixed responses in the academia. Promising applications of ChatGPT in university education has been suggested; however, several concerns were raised. The aim of this descriptive study was to investigate the pros and cons of ChatGPT use in medical, dental, pharmacy, and public health education. Based on expert panel discussion and review of the existing literature, specific and concise ChatGPT prompts were constructed and the responses were generated on 25 February 2023. Out data suggested that in medical education, ChatGPT benefits included the possibility of improving personalized learning, clinical reasoning and understanding of complex medical concepts. The benefits listed in the context of dental education included improved skills through step-by-step instructions and interactive content, with instant feedback on student techniques. In pharmacy education, the advantages included possible explanations of complex subjects and the deployment of interactive tools aiding to develop skills for patient counselling. In public health education, the listed benefits included providing explanations and case scenarios, besides improved skills in data analysis and literature review. The limitations listed based on ChatGPT-generated content were common across all of the investigated healthcare disciplines and included data privacy issues, risk of generating biased and inaccurate content, and the risk of deterioration of critical thinking and communication skills among healthcare students. The ChatGPT-generated content in the context of healthcare education was deemed partially helpful by the expert panel. However, several important points regarding the pros and cons of ChatGPT use in medical, dental, pharmacy and public health education were missed by ChatGPT-generated content including: the risk of plagiarism, copyright issues, the risk of academic dishonesty, and the lack of personal and emotional interactions necessary for developing proper communication skills in healthcare education. In conclusion, despite the promising prospects of ChatGPT in healthcare education, several drawbacks should be addressed with implementation of guidelines for proper use to ensure exploiting the benefits of this innovative technology.

Cancer is one of the leading causes of death globally. The development of drug resistance is the main contributor to cancer-related mortality. Cancer cells exploit multiple mechanisms to reduce the therapeutic effects of anticancer drugs, thereby causing chemotherapy failure. Natural products are accessible, inexpensive, and less toxic sources of chemotherapeutic agents. Additionally, they have multiple mechanisms of action to inhibit various targets involved in the development of drug resistance. In this review, we have summarized the basic research and clinical applications of natural products as possible inhibitors for drug resistance in cancer. The molecular targets and the mechanisms of action of each natural product are also explained. Diverse drug resistance biomarkers were sensitive to natural products. P-glycoprotein and breast cancer resistance protein can be targeted by a large number of natural products. On the other hand, protein kinase C and topoisomerases were less sensitive to most of the studied natural products. The studies discussed in this review will provide a solid ground for scientists to explore the possible use of natural products in combination anticancer therapies to overcome drug resistance by targeting multiple drug resistance mechanisms.