Research England

ABSTRACT Many businesses, particularly small businesses, are underinvesting in cyber security. This exposes them to the risk of costly cyber attack. To address the challenge of cyber security in small businesses a greater understanding is needed of why businesses are underinvesting. To address this challenge, we propose a novel framework to distinguish five behavioral types and quantify the proportion of businesses fitting each type. The types are overconfident, procrastinator, risk accepting, defer responsibility, and optimal. We apply our framework using data from the UK Government’s Cyber Security Breaches Survey from 2018–2024. We find that procrastination and overconfidence are the main reasons for underinvestment in cyber security in small businesses. We also find that small businesses with cyber insurance and/or cyber outsourcing are more likely to be classified as optimal. These results can inform policy interventions that better target the root cause of underinvestment in cyber security.

CBPP had persisted in Europe for the first half of the 20th century before appearing to die out in the late 1960s. Then, the disease reappeared in France in 1980, Spain in 1981, Portugal in 1983 and, finally, Italy in 1990. The isolates from these new outbreaks were almost identical. Furthermore, comparative analysis of the new European isolates with African strains showed that the former were biochemically and immunologically quite different. Subsequently, genetic analysis revealed a genomic segment of 8.8 kb, present in African strains, which was completely missing in these new European strains; within this region was a copy of the lppB gene, a potential virulence factor, and the glycerol uptake gene. A single European strain from outbreaks in France in 1967 before the re-emergence did not have this deletion. This section will explore the implications and source of these re-emergent strains.

Contagious bovine pleuropneumonia (CBPP), variously known in English as lung plague, lung fever and pleuro-pneumonia, is one of the great historic plagues of cattle along with Foot and Mouth Disease, tuberculosis and rinderpest. The causative agent of CBPP is the wall-less degenerate bacterium called Mycoplasma mycoides subspecies mycoides (previously known as mycoides small colony (SC)) and was the first mycoplasma to be isolated late in the 19th century. The pathogen attacks the lungs and pleural membranes that line the thoracic cavity, causing fever and respiratory distress such as laboured breathing, coughing and nasal discharge. Its main pathological features are the presence of serofibrinous deposits, interstitial pneumonia, interlobular oedema and hepatization giving a marbled appearance of the lung in the acute and subacute phase and capsulated lesions called sequestra in the lungs of chronically affected cattle. Because it is highly contagious with a mortality rate of up to 50% in naïve herds, it causes significant economic losses, particularly to poorer farmers. CBPP is now considered the most important cattle disease in sub-Saharan Africa. The last reported occurrence of CBPP in Europe was in Portugal in 1999 but unconfirmed reports indicate it may still be present in parts of Asia.

هدف البحث إلى تحسين بعض مهارات التواصل اللفظي لدى الأطفال ذوي اضطراب طيف التوحد من خلال التأثير التكاملي للعلاج بالخلايا الجذعية والبرنامج التدريبي، وتكونت عينة البحث من (5) أطفال من ذوي اضطراب طيف التوحد، وقد تراوحت أعمارهم ما بين (6 – 9) أعوام، بمتوسط حسابي قدره (7.20) وانحراف معياري (1.30) وللتحقق من هذا الهدف تم استخدام المنهج شبه التجريبي باستخدام التصميم ذي المجموعة الواحدة ذات القياسين القبلي والبعدي، وتكونت أدوات البحث من مقياس ستانفورد – بينية للذكاء "الصورة الخامسة" (تقنين: محمود أبو النيل وآخرون, 2011)، مقياس جيليام التقديري لتشخيص أعراض وشدة اضطراب التوحد الإصدار الثالث "GAR-3" (إعداد: عادل عبد الله محمد، وعبير أبو المجد محمد، 2020)، ومقياس مهارات التواصل اللفظي لدى الأطفال ذوي اضطراب طيف التوحد (إعداد: الباحثة)، والبرنامج التدريبي (إعداد: الباحثة)، وأسفرت النتائج عن وجود فروق ذات دلالة إحصائية بين متوسطي رتب درجات عينة البحث في القياسين القبلي والبعدي لأبعاد مقياس مهارات التواصل اللفظي لصالح متوسط رتب درجات القياس البعدي، كما أسفرت النتائج عن عدم وجود فروق ذات دلالة إحصائية بين متوسطي رتب درجات أفراد عينة البحث في القياسين البعدي والتتبعي على مقياس مهارات التواصل اللفظي، وهذا يدل على استمرار أثر البرنامج التدريبي بعد انتهاء التطبيق.

Mothers, especially from ethnic minorities face healthcare disparities, resulting in increased delayed goals of care and associated distress. This study aimed to understand the nature of birth trauma contributing to postpartum maternal mental health in East London. SOPHIE- a reflective framework using art and narrative inquiry was applied. A pilot case study (n=5) using pre Page 2 of 4 and post-one group intervention design was conducted for 4-weeks. SOPHIE framework with art workshops facilitated a deeper exploration on several existential and spiritual care aspects. The study revealed disparities in access to healthcare services, social support, and a need to inform policies and programs.

There are many pressing questions about how to deliver adult social care services. Where research evidence exists to address these questions, there is often limited use by social care commissioners, providers and the workforce. Sometimes this is attributed to the lack of perceived relevance and accessibility of the research itself, at other times it is considered to be a matter of individual and organizational capacity. As things stand, there is a gap between social care research and practice. Improving interaction between different stakeholders in the research process is a contemporary mechanism for promoting the production of research that is useful, usable and used. This paper describes one collaborative approach called Research Practice Partnerships (RPPs). These partnerships share the goal of benefit for all partners and are supported by a growing international evidence base. This paper summarizes some of the key literature from different countries and contexts where the approach has been tried. It highlights the main features of RPPs, introduces a project setting up three new partnerships in the care home sector in England and highlights aspects of the theory of change that will guide the evaluation of the partnerships. In doing so, the paper introduces a promising collaborative approach to a social care audience and considers whether RPPs have the potential to achieve meaningful and impactful research in social care contexts.

BackgroundVisceral leishmaniasis (VL), also known as kala-azar, is a neglected tropical disease (NTD) that is fatal if not treated early. The WHO targets the elimination of VL as a public health problem in its 2030 NTD road map. However, improving access to VL diagnosis and treatment remains a major challenge in many VL-endemic countries. Kenya is endemic for VL and is among the top 6 high-disease burden countries in the world.MethodsFIND, through its activities in improving the diagnosis of VL and supporting the elimination of the disease in Kenya, has worked with various county ministries of health (MOH) and central MOH over the last couple of years. FIND’s activities in Marsabit county started in 2018. In this work, we present the implementation of activities and the impacts in Marsabit county. We reviewed the data for 2017 and 2019 outbreaks (before and after the implementation of FIND’s activities) and assessed the importance of improving access and community sensitization to VL diagnosis. We assessed the contribution of each facility to the total distance traveled from a perspective of location optimization.ResultsThere was a sharp increase in the number of people tested in the 2017 outbreak compared to the 2019 outbreak. In 2017, 437 people were tested compared to 2,338 in 2019. The county reported 234 and 688 VL cases in 2017 and 2019, respectively. The data revealed a shift in the demographic structures of cases toward the younger population (mean age in 2017 was 17.6 years and 15.3 years in 2019), with more female cases reported in 2019 compared to 2017. In 2017, 44.4% were 10 years of age or under. In 2019, the proportion 10 years or below was 52.2%. The addition of two new diagnosis facilities in 2018 resulted in a decrease in the distance traveled by confirmed VL cases from 28.1 km in 2017 to 10.8 km in 2019. Assessing the impact of facility placement indicated the most optimal facilities to provide VL diagnostic services and minimize the distance traveled by patients. Adding new facilities reduces the travel distance until a point where the addition of a new facility provides no additional impact.ConclusionThe results from this study indicate the need to carefully consider the placement of health facilities in improving access to VL diagnosis and treatment and could serve as an investment case in deciding when to stop adding new facilities in a particular setting. Extending the activities in Kenya to other VL-endemic countries in East Africa will contribute significantly toward the elimination of the disease, addressing the needs of marginalized populations and leaving no one behind.

Key points Technological and policy developments are changing the context for long‐form scholarly writing. In the face of a changing context, the structures supporting the publication of academic books have been stable. There may be potential benefits in separating the functions of the journal in a decoupled model. Separating functions could also be applied to long‐form scholarly works, with potential benefits that are worth exploring.