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There are limited data to provide better understanding of the knowledge/awareness of general population towards liver health in Asia. We sought to identify the knowledge gaps and attitudes towards liver health and liver diseases as well as evaluate associated individual‐level and macro‐level factors based on contextual analysis. An online survey assessing knowledge, awareness and attitudes towards liver health and disease was conducted among 7500 respondents across 11 countries/territories in Asia. A liver index was created to measure the respondents' knowledge level and the degree of awareness and attitudes. Multilevel logistic regression was performed to identify individual factors and contextual effects that were associated with liver index. The overall liver index (0–100‐point scale) was 62.4 with 6 countries/territories' liver indices greater than this. In the multilevel model, the inclusion of geographical information could explain for 9.6% of the variation. Residing in a country/territory with higher HBV prevalence (80% IOR: 1.20–2.79) or higher HCV death rate (80% IOR: 1.35–3.13) increased the individual probability of obtaining a high overall liver index. Individual factors like age, gender, education, household income, disease history and health screening behaviour were also associated with liver index (all p‐values<0.001). The overall liver index was positively associated with the two macro‐level factors viz. HBV prevalence and HCV death rate. There is a need to formulate policies especially in regions of lower HBV prevalence and HCV death rate to further improve the knowledge, awareness and attitudes of the general public towards liver diseases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To investigate the hydrogeochemical characteristics of groundwater 23 shallow, 30 intermediate and 38 deep wells samples were collected from Sylhet district of Bangladesh, and analyzed for temperature, pH, Eh, EC, DO, DOC, Na+, K+, Ca2+, Mg2+, Cl−, SO42−, NO3−, HCO3−, SiO2−, Fe, Mn and As. Besides, 12 surface water samples from Surma and Kushiyara Rivers were also collected and analyzed to understand the influence into aquifers. Results revealed that, most of the groundwater samples are acidic in nature, and Na–HCO3 is the dominant groundwater type. The mean value of temperature, EC, Na+, K+, Ca2+, Mg2+, Cl−, NO3− and SO42− were found within the range of permissible limits, while most of the samples exceeds the allowable limits of Fe, Mn and As concentrations. However, relatively higher concentration of Fe and Mn were found in deep water samples and reverse trend was found in case of As. The mean concentrations of As in shallow, intermediate and deep wells were 39.3, 25.3 and 21.4 µg/L respectively, which varied from 0.03 to 148 µg/L. From spatial distribution, it was found that Fe, Mn and As concentrations are high but patchy in northern, north-western, and south-western part of Sylhet region. The most influential geochemical process in study area were identified as silicate weathering, characterized by active cation exchange process and carbonate weathering, which thereby can enhance the elemental concentrations in groundwater. Pearson's correlation matrix, principal component analysis and cluster analysis were also employed to evaluate the controlling factors, and it was found that, both natural and anthropogenic sources were influencing the groundwater chemistry of the aquifers. However, surface water has no significant role to contaminate the aquifers, rather geogenic factors affecting the trace elemental contamination. Thus it is expected that, outcomes of this study will provide useful insights for future groundwater monitoring and management of the study area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the years, tourism has emerged as the world's largest peacetime industry employing approximately 221 million people worldwide. According to the UNWTO, the tourist traffic rose to a record 1.087 billion arrivals in 2013 and this surge is expected to continue through 2030, in annual increments of 3.8 percent. Much of this unprecedented boom may be attributed to newly-affluent Asian nations such as Taiwan, South Korea and Malaysia as well as the huge populations of China, India and Indonesia - the first, second and fourth most populated countries in the world. Many analysts worry that the Asia Pacific region - a collection of dissimilar states squeezed between the Indian Ocean and the Pacific - could potentially be gaining market shares at the expense of their older rivals. We disagree with such a notion and will argue instead that the boom in East Asian tourist traffic is attributable to local factors primarily. Our examination of tourism data from the World Development Indicators database comprising a total of 92 countries covering a 16-year period (1995-2011), provides strong empirical support for our claim that the regional variation in tourism growth does not imply that some destinations are gaining at the expense of the rest. We examine changes in tourist arrivals among all relevant bilateral country pairs to test for a link between changes in tourist arrivals in Southeast Asian nations with Europe and North America. We do find that growth in tourist arrivals to countries of Southeast Asia has been particularly strong, but at the same time, tourism growth to Eastern Europe and to the Middle East has also been strong. This suggests that tourism is driven at least partly by economic growth of a destination, and it may also drive that growth. In examining changes in tourist arrivals by bilateral country pairs we find that for the vast majority of cases there is no support for the hypothesis that growth of tourism in one location comes at the expense of tourist arrivals to other countries. The tourism industry is dynamic and growing, and the success of new destinations does not come at the expense of traditional destinations. Rather countries seem to be establishing niches for themselves in terms of tourist offerings and as such may well be more complementary to each other than competitive. All countries--both developed and developing--may be able to stake a claim in the ever expanding global tourist trade. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Acculturating to a host country has a negative impact on immigrant women's breastfeeding practices, particularly when coming from countries where breastfeeding rates are higher than Western countries. Whether this is true of those immigrating to the UK remains to be investigated. The study aimed to explore whether acculturating to the UK had detrimental effects on breastfeeding practices of South Asian women, and to provide explanations as to how acculturation may have exerted its influence. Twenty South Asian women completed semi-structured interviews exploring infant feeding experiences. Data were thematically analysed. A bidimensional measure assessed women's acculturation status. Women displaying low acculturation levels were aware of living in a formula-feeding culture but this had little influence on breastfeeding intentions/behaviours; drawing upon South Asian cultural teachings of the psychological benefits of breast milk. These women opted to formula-feed in response to their child's perceived demands or in a bid to resolve conflict; either when receiving information about the best feeding method or between their roles as a mother and daughter-in-law. Highly acculturated women also experienced such conflict; their awareness of the formula-feeding culture governed feeding choice. The findings provide a picture of how acculturation may affect South Asian women's breastfeeding intentions and behaviours; encouraging health service providers to meet the varying needs of an acculturating population. If breastfeeding is to be encouraged, it is necessary to understand factors influencing feeding choice; with particular attention to the acculturation pathways that may govern such decisions. This paper highlights ways to tailor information for South Asian women depending on levels of acculturation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How should constitutional design respond to competing claims for official language status in countries where there is more than one language, whose speakers are concentrated in a specific territory, and hence, where more than one language is a plausible candidate for use in public services, public education, legislatures, the courts, and public administration? This is one of the most pervasive and pressing constitutional problems of modern political life. It has been largely ignored in the literatures on comparative constitutional law and constitutional design. This article therefore turns to constitutional practice, and focuses on South Asia, where linguistic nationalism has been one of the principal forces shaping constitutional developments for over sixty years. South Asia has been a constitutional laboratory on questions of linguistic nationalism, and vividly illustrates both that it is possible to manage linguistic nationalism through constitutional design, and conversely, that the cost of getting official-language policy wrong can be very high. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper investigates the day of the week effect on seven emerging Asian stock markets returns and conditional variance (volatility). The empirical research was conducted using the GARCH model and daily returns from India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, South Korea, Taiwan, and Thailand from January 1990 to June 1995. Results obtained indicate the significant presence of the day of the week effect on both stock returns and volatility, though the result involving both the return and volatility are not identical in all seven cases. Results also show that these effects may be due to a possible spill-over from the Japanese stock market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]