Browsing by Author "Omotoso, Olabode"

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    Life Expectancy and SARS-CoV-2 Genomic Variations Plays Key Role in COVID-19 Transmission and Low Fatality Rate in Africa
    (2020-09-21) Omotoso, Olabode
    The novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) has claimed lots of lives, posing a dire threat to public health and the global economy. The present study determined the severe acute respiratory syndrome-2 (SARS-CoV-2) genomic variability and the contributory factors to the observed low fatality rate in Africa. To assess the SARS-CoV-2 mutational landscape, 924 viral sequences from the Africa region with their sociobiological characteristics mined from the GISAID database were analyzed. The age of infected patients, the number of tests done, confirmed cases, recovery, fatality, and countries' age distribution were obtained to determine the age distribution, testing, recovery, and fatality rate. Mutational analysis of the SARS-CoV-2 sequences revealed highly recurrent mutations in the Spike glycoprotein D614G (97.2%), concurrent R203K, and G204R (65.2% respectively) in the N protein region, and P4715L (97.2%) in the RNA dependent RNA polymerase region. COVID-19 is more severe in older people (> 65 years), Africa has a low percentage of people within this age group (4.36%). The average age of the 924 infected patients in this study is 46 years with only 47 infected patients (5.1%) above 65 years in comparison to 13.12% in countries in other continents with the highest prevalence of COVID-19. Africa's young generation, the late incidence of the disease, and adherence to public health guidelines are important indicators that may have contributed to the observed low COVID-19 deaths in Africa. However, sufficient data is still unavailable due to low testing rate to ascertain the epidemiology, transmission, genomic variation, and the true impact of the pandemic in Africa
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    Practice of Breast Self-Examination and Knowledge of Breast and Cervical Cancer Screening: A bi-national Survey in Africa
    (2020-11-27) Omotoso, Olabode; Matariek, Ghadier; Omotoso, Elizabeth; Matareek, Amira; Abdul-Rafee, Ghada, Mahmoud; Malakar, Sucheta; Chutia, Nabanita
    Background: The burden of breast and cervical cancer is increasing exponentially, especially among women in low- and mid-income countries due to late diagnosis, unhealthy lifestyle choices and adoption of western lifestyles. Early detection, hinged on screening uptake is a key to higher survival rate and managing cancer outcome. Despite some improvement noticed in developed countries, the control of these preventable diseases in African countries including Nigeria and Egypt seems insurmountable. Therefore, this study focused on assessing the knowledge and uptake of Nigerians and Egyptians towards breast self-examination (BSE) and breast and cervical cancer screening. Results: A community-based cross-sectional questionnaire was utilized in both countries to obtain 1,006 respondents via a convenient sampling method. The mean age of study participants was 30.43 6.69. About one-third of participants had a good knowledge (> 66 %) of breast cancer screening (423, 42 %), cervical cancer screening (446, 44 %) and BSE practice (363, 36 %). Age range (26 40 years), educational level (tertiary) and marital status were demographic data that influenced knowledge level. Though with a fairly satisfactory knowledge level, the screening uptake among studied population is very poor as only (111, 11 %) had ever been screened and only (22, 2.2 %) ever vaccinated. The major reasons for poor screening uptake were no awareness of where to be screened and no symptoms. Conclusions: Assessing the knowledge and uptake level of African women through studies like this is crucial in identifying the loopholes in the fight against cancer in Africa. More efforts are required in promoting utilization of cancer screening services, HPV vaccination and BSE practice among African women. The media and internet should be leveraged on as they are the major sources of information about cancer among the respondents.