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All staff have the right to be themselves in the workplace. Here are some simple steps managers can take to ensure organisations are supportive of trans, non-binary and gender-questioning employees

With increasingly complex and globalised supply chains, agricultural production and related impacts are often far removed from the point of final demand and difficult to trace. Accurately linking consumption to production is essential to understand drivers, key actors, and to facilitate actionable adaptation strategies to minimise negative impacts and guarantee food security. Here a hybridised multiregional input-output (MRIO) model, IOTA, is introduced. IOTA utilises sub-national and national level production, trade and environmental data, national scale commodity-use data, and a global economic MRIO, to link sub-national production and associated impacts to regional final consumption. In an example case-study, applying the model to Brazilian soy production and related land use for EU consumption, the relative levels of production in Brazilian states to meet EU demand differ from those of total production, and differ further still between the EU's constituent countries. Patterns can also vary considerably within a country's consumption profile depending on the sector of purchase. The linking of consumption to sub-national production and trade allows for more accurate and meaningful connections to be made between consumer behaviour and the associated impacts and risks. This enhanced understanding of consumption-driven impacts in turn informs, and allows for, more targeted and effective policy interventions to tackle the pressures and risks associated with agricultural commodity production for a global market.

Abstract Background A meeting was organized by Drugs for Neglected Diseases initiative (DNDi) and the Institute Pasteur (IP), Paris, to review the treatment for all forms of cutaneous leishmaniasis (CL) and to propose a strategy for the development of new efficacious and affordable treatments. Method The global burden of CL was discussed with respect to financial impact; relation to poverty; the stigma of CL lesions and scars (particularly in young women); lack of effective, affordable, easily implemented tools and political will and resources to implement available control tools; and lack of input from pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies to develop new drugs and vaccines. Results According to the experts from different endemic countries present, the financial and social burdens of CL are high, but we have limited quantitative data. The analysis of published trials indicates that the quality of most trials is poor and requires both improvement and standardization. The available drugs are inadequate. Criteria by which different CL types could be prioritized as target disease were set. These criteria included: severity of the disease; lack of response to available drugs; overall incidence and prevalence of the disease; sequelae of the disease, (including recidivans and mucosal leishmaniasis); the impact of treatment of individuals on control of transmission and lack of other major parties involved in drug development. Based on these, the anthroponotic CL and its sequel "recidivans" caused by L. tropica and CL caused by L. braziliensis and its sequel, mucosal leishmaniasis were considered to be the target diseases. The mechanism for controlling Leishmania infection to reach a stable self healing process is a balanced immune response. Immune stimulation during chemotherapy can enhance cure. There is no adequately effective vaccine, but some encouraging results have been obtained with whole killed Leishmania parasites or imiquimod (an immuno-modulator) plus antimonials. Further studies are needed. One safety/immunogenicity clinical trial is currently ongoing with a Second Generation Vaccine (SGV). Conclusions and recommendations There is an urgent need for new treatments for all CL types. CL should be considered as a neglected disease and organizations, such as DNDi, should include it in their list of target diseases. It was agreed that immuno-chemotherapy (with "therapeutic" vaccines or immunomodulators) has a strong potential to make an impact as a new therapy of CL with the view of shortening/reducing duration and dose of drug treatment and preventing resistance. There is also a need for safe, affordable and efficacious new .

African swine fever (ASF) is a highly contagious disease affecting all suids including wild boar. As the disease can damage commercial pig production and its circulation can threaten international trade, understanding the risks produced by free-living wild boar (as a wildlife reservoir) is important to ensure proportionate policies to exclude the disease, as well as an effective contingency response. The recent spread of the virus into Western Europe has produced concerns in many stakeholders including pig producers and national governments. Unlike in mainland Europe, where wild boar are widespread, in Britain, free-living populations have only recently re-established, and whilst these are still relatively small and isolated, they may provide a sufficient reservoir capable of sustaining disease and may thus present a continual source of infection risk to domestic pigs. This study focuses on one component of the risk produced by wild boar, specifically the distribution and persistence of virus in a landscape produced by the natural circulation of disease within wild boar. We used a spatial individual-based model run across a representation of a real landscape to explore the epidemiological consequences of an introduction of ASF into the Forest of Dean, currently hosting the largest population of wild boar in England. We explore various scenarios including variations in the prophylactic management of boar, as well as variations in reactive management (contingency response) following the detection of disease to evaluate their value in reducing this specific risk (presence of ASF virus of wild boar origin in the landscape). The abundance and distribution of wild boar is predicted to increase across our study extent over the next 20 years. Outbreaks of ASF are not predicted to be self-sustaining, with the median time to disease "burn-out" (no new infections) being 14 weeks. Carcass removal, as a tool in a package of reactive management, was of limited value in reducing the duration of outbreaks in this study. We ...

Abstract ContextImproving the welfare outcomes for captured animals is critically important and should underpin 'best-practice' trapping. Most Australian States and Territories have regulations and guidelines that form a legal framework for the maximum number of hours an animal can be restrained in a trap. Because servicing all traps within preferred time frames (less than 24h) can be logistically difficult or is considered undesirable for efficacy reasons, some jurisdictions have adopted relatively long trap-checking intervals (up to 72 h). AimsWe developed and tested the signal transmission and alert efficacy of a foot hold-trap alert system, based on Celium technology, so as to advise trappers of the activation of individual foot-hold traps, even in remote locations. MethodsWe refined the Celium trap-alert system and designed a below-ground wireless node that transmits a message via satellite or by using the cellular system when a foot-hold trap is sprung. We tested signal transmission and alert efficacy in three locations, with a focus in Australia. Key resultsTransmission of signals from nodes to hubs and to a smart-phone application were used to resolve interference problems and to identify signal limitations and strengths. During the capture of 34 dingoes, 91% of captures resulted in an alert being received. False negatives were attributed to technical issues with nearby transmitters swamping signals, and software problems that have since been resolved. In 40 captures of dogs and foxes, only one trap-alert transmitter (mole) was uncovered by a target animal and no devices were damaged by animals post-capture. ConclusionsThis cable-less trap-alert system successfully uses both cellular and satellite networks to transmit messages from desert and coastal locations to trappers, in Australia. We confirmed that this trap-alert system is not detected by target predators in the areas tested and can be effectively used to alert trappers when traps have been sprung. ImplicationsThis trap-alert system provides a tool to improve welfare outcomes for trapped target and non-target animals through Australia and New Zealand and wherever trapping occurs. It, furthermore, provides a solution to checking traps daily when the distance to and between traps cannot be covered within an appropriate time frame. Although trap alerts can never replace the value of daily trap checking by the trapper, they provide a solution to a management problem, namely, one of accessibility to sites.

Miltefosine, an effective oral treatment of visceral leishmaniasis (VL), was selected in May 2005, by the governments of India, Nepal, and Bangladesh for the elimination of VL. However, abnormally high treatment failure rates reported in patients in Bangladesh, given a miltefosine generic product ("Miltefos", Popular Pharmaceuticals Ltd.) during 2008, led the World Health Organization (WHO) to procure this formulation for quality testing. Proton ((1)H) and phosphorous ((31)P) nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) analyses of the Miltefos™ capsules did not give the peaks defined for Impavido®, the quality assured VL treatment product from Aeterna Zentaris. Contents of capsules of Impavido® yielded expected peaks for miltefosine (m/z 408.33 for the protonated parent ion and m/z 183.99 plus m/z 124.8 the fragment ions) that were absent in the Miltefos™ capsules. Furthermore, testing using an in vitro Leishmania donovani intracellular amastigote-macrophage model, yielded EC50 values of between 2.55 and 4.06 μg/mL and 3.02 to 5.92 μg/mL for extracts from the Impavido® capsules and the miltefosine standard, respectively. Lack of significant anti-leishmanial activity of Miltefos™ capsules was identified in this assay even at concentrations up to 100 μg/mL. Capsules of Miltefos™ were classified as falsified (absence of stated active pharmaceutical ingredient) by three methods-NMR and mass spectrometry analysis and bioassay.

Abstract
By using the latest available data, we provide estimates of wild boar (Sus scrofa) distribution and abundance pre‐African Swine Fever (ASF) based on occurrence data in Europe. Secondly, as a basis for the calibration model output into densities, we used the predictions of relative abundance, and hunting yield‐based model (hunted individuals per km2), at 2x2 km for wild boar (by ENETWILD Consortium) and local wild boar densities (individuals per km2) considered reliable and obtained in the framework of the European Observatory of Wildlife (EOW), as well as some from recent literature (2015 onwards). Hunting yield predictions were considered at different spatial scales namely 5, 10 and 15 km radii buffer around localities with density estimations. The calibration of hunting yield‐based model into densities are a better fit for 15 km radius buffer and a significant relationship between model predictions of hunting yield and reliable density values at European level. This calibration of wild boar hunting yield‐based model into densities will offer the possibility to predict density values of wild boar. This will be useful to incorporate into risk factor analyses for African Swine Fever at the selected spatial range. This is the first time that absolute density estimates have been made using these two approaches for Europe, which demonstrates the added value of the observatory approach (a number of study areas where reliable density values are obtained, such as from the EOW) to generate novel information of high value for epidemiological assessment. During an ASF outbreak hunting effort will change dramatically and will take a few years to return to similar pre‐ASF levels, so post‐ASF estimates of density would be limited to areas where ASF has been present for a while. However, there will be relatively limited effect on sighting data as these rely on a number of different actors, many of whom may be expected to return to normal activities relatively soon after ASF arrives. Thus, relative post‐ASF wild boar density may be more reliable in the short term. These relative post‐ASF densities were calculated but with the limited sighting data available at the chosen locations the uncertainty was high. We advocate for the developing this nework of wildlife monitoring across Europe, and in general, harmioized wildlife monitoring programs, ensuring standardisation and consistency in the data generated and collected, which is essential for assessing management and risks related not only to ASF but other wildlife diseases.

BACKGROUND: Effective case identification strategies are fundamental to capturing the remaining visceral leishmaniasis (VL) cases in India. To inform government strategies to reach and sustain elimination benchmarks, this study presents costs of active- and passive- case detection (ACD and PCD) strategies used in India's most VL-endemic state, Bihar, with a focus on programme outcomes stratified by district-level incidence. METHODS: Expenditure analysis was complemented by onsite micro-costing to compare the cost of PCD in hospitals alongside index case-based ACD and a combination of blanket (house-to-house) and camp ACD from January to December 2018. From the provider's perspective, a cost analysis evaluated the overall programme cost of each activity, the cost per case detected, and the cost of scaling up ACD. RESULTS: During 2018, index case-based ACD, blanket and camp ACD, and PCD reported 1,497, 131, and 1,983 VL-positive cases at a unit cost of $522.81, $4,186.81, and $246.79, respectively. In high endemic districts, more VL cases were identified through PCD while in meso- and low-endemic districts more cases were identified through ACD. The cost of scaling up ACD to identify 3,000 additional cases ranged from $1.6-4 million, depending on the extent to which blanket and camp ACD was relied upon. CONCLUSION: Cost per VL test conducted (rather than VL-positive case identified) may be a better metric estimating unit costs to scale up ACD in Bihar. As more VL cases were identified in meso-and low-endemic districts through ACD than PCD, health authorities in India should consider bolstering ACD in these areas. Blanket and camp ACD identified fewer cases at a higher unit cost than index case-based ACD. However, the value of detecting additional VL cases early outweighs long-term costs for reaching and sustaining VL elimination benchmarks in India.

Consumption of globally traded agricultural commodities like soy and palm oil is one of the primary causes of deforestation and biodiversity loss in some of the world's most species-rich ecosystems. However, the complexity of global supply chains has confounded efforts to reduce impacts. Companies and governments with sustainability commitments struggle to understand their own sourcing patterns, while the activities of more unscrupulous actors are conveniently masked by the opacity of global trade. We combine state-of-the art material flow, economic trade and biodiversity impact models to produce an innovative approach for understanding the impacts of trade on biodiversity loss and the roles of remote markets and actors. We do this for the production of soy in the Brazilian Cerrado, home to more than 5% of the world´s species. Distinct sourcing patterns of consumer countries and trading companies result in substantially different impacts on endemic species. Connections between individual buyers and specific hotspots explain the disproportionate impacts of some actors on endemic species and individual threatened species, such as the particular impact of EU consumers on the recent habitat losses for the iconic Giant Anteater (Myrmecophaga tridactyla). In making these linkages explicit, our approach enables commodity buyers and investors to target their efforts much more closely to improve the sustainability of their supply chains in their sourcing regions, while also transforming our ability to monitor the impact of such commitments over time.

Consumption of globally traded agricultural commodities like soy and palm oil is one of the primary causes of deforestation and biodiversity loss in some of the world's most species-rich ecosystems. However, the complexity of global supply chains has confounded efforts to reduce impacts. Companies and governments with sustainability commitments struggle to understand their own sourcing patterns, while the activities of more unscrupulous actors are conveniently masked by the opacity of global trade. We combine state-of-the-art material flow, economic trade, and biodiversity impact models to produce an innovative approach for understanding the impacts of trade on biodiversity loss and the roles of remote markets and actors. We do this for the production of soy in the Brazilian Cerrado, home to more than 5% of the world´s species. Distinct sourcing patterns of consumer countries and trading companies result in substantially different impacts on endemic species. Connections between individual buyers and specific hot spots explain the disproportionate impacts of some actors on endemic species and individual threatened species, such as the particular impact of European Union consumers on the recent habitat losses for the iconic giant anteater (Myrmecophaga tridactyla). In making these linkages explicit, our approach enables commodity buyers and investors to target their efforts much more closely to improve the sustainability of their supply chains in their sourcing regions while also transforming our ability to monitor the impact of such commitments over time.