This prospective case-control study was conducted on 105 consecutive cases admitted to the burn units of Dhaka Shishu Hospital and Dhaka Medical College Hospital. The same number of controls were selected randomly from the community and matched with respect to age group, sex, and location of residence within the defined metropolitan area during the period January to September 1997. Both the controls and cases were divided into three age groups. Group A (19 controls and 19 cases) included neonates and infants, group B included children from 1 to 4 years, and group C included children from 4 to 12 years. The mean age of the controls in group A was 8.42+/-3.86 months and in group B and C was 5.72+/-4.05 years. The mean age of cases in group A was 4.79+/-4.05 months and in group B and C was 5.08+/-2.87 years. A scoring system was used to analyze 14 socioeconomic and cultural factors, which indicated highly significant differences between controls and cases (P < 0.001), and also between male (P < 0.001) and female (P < 0.001) controls and cases. There were significant differences between controls and cases in group A (P < 0.001), group B (P < 0.01), and group C (P < 0.001). Differences were not significant between males and females within groups A, B, and C for cases or controls (P > 0.05). Regression analysis of the total scores for cases and controls indicated a negative correlation between burns and the socioeconomic variables included in the study. There were highly significant associations between burns and lack of alertness to burns among parents (P < 0.001), clothing of manmade fabrics (P < 0.001), and cooking equipment in the kitchen within reach of children (P < 0.001). There was a significant association between burns and illiteracy of the mother (P < 0.01), housing located in slums and congested areas (P < 0.01), illiteracy of the father (P < 0.02), presence of preexisting impairment in children (P < 0.05), presence of a history of burns among siblings (P < 0.05), and low economic status of the parents (P < 0.05). No significant associations were indicated between controls and cases with respect to number of children in the family (P > 0.1), family pattern (P > 0.1), conjugal bonding between parents (P > 0.5), and sibling's death and disability from burns (P > 0.5). It is evident that an increase in alertness to burns, easy availability of clothing of natural fabrics, keeping cooking equipment beyond the reach of the children, increased literacy among parents and children, and improvement in family income might decrease the incidence of burns in children.
The concept of poverty has evolved into a multifaceted socioeconomic measure rather than merely a monetary assessment. Cognizant of this advancement, this study was designed to investigate the variations in rural poverty across the regions in Pakistan using the multidimensional poverty assessment approach based on three socioeconomic dimensions, that is, health, education, and housing. Findings revealed a considerable variation in the magnitude of rural multidimensional poverty (MDP) across the regions. Temporal analysis portrayed the inconsistent declining trends of MDP over the time periods, that is, 1998-1999, 2001-2002, 2004-2005, 2005-2006, and 2007-2008. The study also identified the regions where rural MDP remained consistently high in all time periods. In view of the higher variation in MDP across the regions, planners may re-articulate their rural poverty alleviation strategies with more focus on the identified poor regions.
Social development of workers has always been a major concern in history. This study, therefore focuses on social development inequalities among steel industry workers in one development zone (Badami Bagh area and along Sheikhupura road of Lahore) of Pakistan. A total of 225 workers were interviewed randomly following the stratified random sampling technique. Principal Component Analysis (PCA) technique was used to construct the socioeconomic score (SES) index. Five categories of socioeconomic index were measured using multinomial logistic regression model. A correlation matrix was calculated for PCA. Results revealed that type/size of industry has negative relation while skill level has positive relation with SES. Job status and transport facility did not reflect a significant impact to SES of workers. Correlation matrix depicted that age, experience and medical treatment have positive relation while formal education, number of dependents and distance to job showed a negative trend in relation with SES.
Background: Hypospadias is a developmental anomaly characterized by a urethral meatus that opens onto the ventral surface of the penis, proximal to the end of glans.
Hydrological models play a key role to simulate and assess climate and land use/cover (LULC) change impacts on hydrology in a watershed. In this study, the impact of climate and LULC change was investigated using the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) model. The simulated and observed streamflow showed a good agreement. Both Nash–Sutcliffe Efficiency (NSE) and coefficient of determination (R2) were found to be greater than 0.7 during the calibration (1985–2002) and validation (2003–2012) period. The water balance components were simulated with inputs from downscaled Global Climate Models (GCMs) data (i.e., future scenario (2030–2100) relative to a baseline period (1974–2004)) under RCP4.5 and RCP8.5, and hypothetical generated LULC change scenarios. All GCMs projected an increase in temperature over the Kabul River Basin (KRB), whereas there was a lack of agreement on projected precipitation among GCMs under both emission and future scenarios. Water yield (WYLD) and evapotranspiration (ET) were projected to decrease in the 21st century. Average annual WYLD was projected to increase under the agriculture-dominant scenario, whereas it decreased under forest and grassland-dominant scenarios. These results are valuable for relevant agencies and stakeholders to adopt measures to counter the negative impacts of climate and LULC change on water resources.
This paper estimates and maps the multidimensional poverty for rural Pakistan. It uses micro data from household surveys to construct the Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) with human development indicators like education, health, standard of living and wealth. Furthermore, it identifies multiple deprivations at individual level contributions in education, health, standard of living and wealth in the rural multidimensional poverty as overall and district levels. The results show that the 59 percent rural population of Pakistan is poor. The district Thatta, in Sindh, district Dera Ghazi Khan in Punjab and the district Nowshera in the KPK record highest multidimensional poverty index. No district is included from Baluchistan due to unavailability of data. It is expounded that the policy makers can develop the strategies to reduce the rural poverty by enhancing rural education, improving living standards and creating opportunities for income.
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