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Drug trafficking in the tiny state of Manipur, located in the northeastern part of India bordering Myanmar, has drawn attention from all over the globe looking at the scale and varieties of drugs trafficked, ranging from plant-based opiates to synthetic-based amphetamine-type stimulants (ATS). Moreover, drug trafficking in the region also comes with many socio-political dynamics such as high per-capita drug consumption, local drug manufacturing units, terror funding from drug money, politician–drug lord nexus, police–peddler nexus.

The study is based on data from the years 2007 to 2023 accessed from the Narcotics and Affairs of Borders, a specialized branch of Manipur Police, Government of Manipur. The study also tries to estimate the state’s drug economy using the Financial Action Task Force and the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime methodology.

The study finds seizure of a massive cache of heroin/brown sugar, and ATS in the past 4–5 years. The study also finds large-scale destruction of poppy plants in the state. The study also finds a high percentage of ethnic minority communities involved in drug trafficking. The study found the value amounting to US$62m in 2022. The study also comes across low conviction rates of drug traffickers in the state.

The study emphasizes the need for expediting the War on Drugs campaign in the state curtailing poppy cultivation and conviction of drug lords so that the nerve center of terror funding in India’s eastern front is kept under control.

The purpose of this study is to establish Loratadine [LRD] quantification in purified and capsule formulations using a precise and specific Reversal Phase with a very high-performance liquid Chromatographic [RP-HPLC] technique. The approach was evaluated in agreement with the principles of the International Conference on Harmonization [ICH]. Arcus EP-C18 Ion Pac column, 5 m, 4.6 mm, 250 mm, mobile phase Methanol: Acetonitrile (60:40) v/v. Dibasic potassium phosphate buffer, pH 7.2, flow rate 1.0 ml/min.

The HPLC system used a 340 nm UV detector for testing. A 10-min run time was used for the analysis. At concentrations ranging from 2 to 10 g/ml, the technique was linear (R² = 0.9998), exact (intra-day and inter-day relative standard deviation [RSD] values 1.0%), accurate (range recovery = 96%–102%), exclusive and strong.

The detecting and quantitation limits were 0.92 g/ml and 2.15 g/ml, respectively.

The findings demonstrated that the proposed method could accurately determine LRD in bulk and pill dose formats quickly and accurately.

Cannabis as a recreational drug is prohibited in Nigeria. Consequently, the open use of cannabis attracts both formal and informal sanctions. As such, there is much stigma on users' faces across social spaces. This has led to innovations in drug use. Recently, non-medical use of tramadol has been rising across each of the gender categories. This study aims to understand (1) tramadol use prompts, (2) the sudden surge in gendered recreational use of tramadol and (3) the gendered challenges of recreational tramadol use among Nigerian university students.

Data were collected between December 2021 and October 2022. The researcher conducted 20 semi-structured interviews, with participants chosen purposefully from acquaintances and others selected through chain referral. The selection criteria included knowledge of a particular tramadol tablet and willingness to participate. This study got ethical approval from the Anambra State Ministry of Health (Ref: MH/AWK/M/321/354) and oral consent was obtained before the interviews. The participants were assured of confidentiality. The interviews were conducted in English (the formal Nigerian language) and lasted between 30 and 65 min. The data collected were transcribed and coded manually, and themes generated.

Findings suggest that peer pressures accounted for entry-level drug use. However, cannabis-related stigma is attributed to the surge in tramadol use across gender categories. Furthermore, academic pressure and sexuality are major reasons for tramadol use. The challenges associated with tramadol use include headaches and addiction.

This study, to the best of the author’s knowledge, presents alternative data on the surge in tramadol use among Nigerian university students.

The pharmaceutical industry is facing significant pressure to tackle antimicrobial resistance (AMR). Other ecological, societal and regulatory pressures are also driving the industry to “go green”. While such a (green) transition could be possible through appropriate green practices’ implementation, the present understanding about it is superficial and vague. A key reason is the lack of green practices’-related studies on pharmaceuticals, which are also insufficiently comprehensive. This knowledge gap is sought to be addressed.

A systematic literature review (SLR) was conducted with 73 carefully selected articles, then subjected to thematic content analyses for synthesising the relevant themes and sub-themes.

Around 76 operational-level green practices covering all key stakeholders across the drug lifecycle were identified. It was revealed that designing drugs having accelerated environmental degradability is important to combat AMR. Also, redesigning existing drugs is environmentally more resource-intensive than developing new ones with significant cost-saving potential in solvent recycling and flexible manufacturing, both of which are not common at present. With regards to green-related barriers, stringent quality requirements on drugs (and therefore risks in making relevant green-oriented modifications) and time-consuming and costly regulatory approvals were found to be the key ones.

The operational green practices’ framework developed for individual pharmaceutical supply chain stakeholders could help practitioners in benchmarking, modifying and ultimately, adopting green practices. The findings could also assist policymakers in reframing existing regulations, such as Good Manufacturing Practices or GMP-related, to promote greener drug development.

This work is the first systematic attempt to identify and categorise operational-level green supply chain practices across stakeholders in the pharmaceutical sector.

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  Biodegradability of drugs is more important than environmental degradability.

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  Flexible manufacturing process design (or quality by design) reduces resource wastage.

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  Ecopharmacovigilance is effective in combating PIE and AMR-related issues.

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  Upstream and downstream coordination is key to greening pharma operations.

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  Costly and time-consuming regulatory approval is a key barrier to greening pharma processes.

Biodegradability of drugs is more important than environmental degradability.

Flexible manufacturing process design (or quality by design) reduces resource wastage.

Ecopharmacovigilance is effective in combating PIE and AMR-related issues.

Upstream and downstream coordination is key to greening pharma operations.

Costly and time-consuming regulatory approval is a key barrier to greening pharma processes.

Business process training is a crucial activity in the business process management lifecycle, performed whenever an organization needs to train workers about how to carry out their activities according to defined processes, after significant process changes, or whenever new workers come on board. Due to their motivational character, serious games have been understood as an unconventional alternative to support training in organizational processes. Still, methodologies to design serious digital games specifically for business process training are missing in the literature. This research paper presents a method – Play Your Process for Training (PYP4Training) – for designing digital games for business process training.

The research is guided by design science research methodologies and comprises the adaptation of Play Your Process (PYP), a method for designing business process-based digital games (BPBDG). PYP activities and supporting tools were shaped to cope with the specific requirements of BPBDG design for process training purposes, bringing to light a new method: PYP4Training.

PYP4Training was evaluated by designing a BPBDG for training a heavy equipment maintenance process in a multinational mining company. The game was evaluated by process owners and actors who reported a positive perception of the game as an option for process training. However, there is still space for improving trainees' engagement.

The research proposes an innovative way for business process training using digital games. Nevertheless, literature shows a lack of systematic procedures to build such games and results about their use.

The purpose of the study is to investigate female prisoners’ perspectives on why they gain weight while in prison.

A qualitative design was used with semi-structured interviews with six females currently residing in a prison in the south of England.

Analysis of the data generated three themes relating to the reasons why women gain weight in prison. These were labelled as “The only thing you haven’t got to ask permission for is your food, it’s just handed to you”, “If you’ve been stripped of the things that make you happy, or that you are addicted to, eating can soothe you” and “prison can make you take better care of your health”.

The results identify perceived reasons why women gain weight in prison uniquely from the female prisoner perspective. The implications of the research identify the need for systemic change throughout different prison departments to enable women to maintain a healthy weight during their custodial sentence.

A growing body of research finds a consistently negative relationship between medical cannabis access and aggregate measures of opioid use. Nothing is currently known about the types of opioids that are being most impacted by cannabis access. Using the Callaway and Sant’Anna (2021) difference-in-differences (DID) estimator for the main analysis and data on all opioid shipments to every United States (US) pharmacy from 2006 to 2014, the authors found no evidence of overall change in the total number of morphine milligram equivalent (MME) units of opioids shipped to pharmacies, following the opening of medical cannabis dispensaries. However, across all opioids, the authors found a reduction in the highest MME dosage strengths (8.8% decrease in 50–89 MME doses and 11.3% decrease in 90+ MME doses). This decrease appears to be driven predominantly by commonly diverted opioids, where the authors found a reduction in the highest MME dosage strengths (12.2% in 50–89 MME doses and 13.8% in 90+ MME doses). Further, the authors see a 6.0% increase in low-to-moderate dose opioids (0–49 MMEs). This is consistent with patients using cannabis concomitantly with opioids in order to achieve a lower opioids dose.

Smart banking services (SBS) are critical for developing countries to achieve developmental goals. The success of SBS is dependent on the considerable perceived customer experience of provided services. Based on technology adoption studies, this study aims to model smart customer experience (SCE) outcomes by investigating the relationships between SCE, customer gratitude, continuance intentions and positive word-of-mouth (P-WOM).

The current research included 384 bank clients as participants. The data were analyzed using partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM).

According to the findings, SCE directly increases customer gratitude, continuance intention to adopt smart services and P-WOM. Customer gratitude enhances continuance intentions and P-WOM. Additionally, customer gratitude mediates the relationship between SCE, continuance intention and P-WOM. Finally, the findings revealed that customer innovativeness and optimism play a substantial moderating impact among the variables studied.

This is the first research to include all of these variables. Furthermore, to the best of the authors' knowledge, this is the first empirical study of these linkages in the banking sector of emerging nations.