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Corruption has found very fertile ground in the health sector. Many studies demonstrate the negative relationship between sustainability and corruption. However, relatively little is known at this time about how to prevent corruption in healthcare organizations (HCOs), and thus to recover the important sustainability of the entire healthcare system. After noticing this gap in the literature, the authors’ aim in undertaking this study was twofold: first, to analyze the current state of knowledge about how Italian HCOs adopt corruption prevention plans in compliance with the National Plan issued by the National Anti-Corruption Authority; second, to identify some clusters of HCOs which represent different adoption patterns of corruption prevention interventions and to classify these HCOs. For these purposes, the authors studied 68 HCOs along 13 dimensions that characterized the corruption prevention plans. The empirical results showed that the HCOs were not fully compliant with the anti-corruption legislation. At the same time, the authors identified three clusters of HCOs with different patterns of anti-corruption prevention interventions. The clusters that adopted some specific interventions seemed to be more sustainable than others.

The COVID-19 pandemic has tremendously affected the whole of human society worldwide. Travel patterns have greatly changed due to the increased risk perception and the governmental interventions regarding COVID-19. This study aimed to identify contributing factors to the changes in public and private transportation mode choice behavior in China after COVID-19 based on an online questionnaire survey. In the survey, travel behaviors in three periods were studied: before the outbreak (before 27 December 2019), the peak (from 20 January to 17 March 2020), and after the peak (from 18 March to the date of the survey). A series of random-parameter bivariate Probit models was developed to quantify the relationship between individual characteristics and the changes in travel mode choice. The key findings indicated that individual sociodemographic characteristics (e.g., gender, age, ownership, occupation, residence) have significant effects on the changes in mode choice behavior. Other key findings included (1) a higher propensity to use a taxi after the peak compared to urban public transportation (i.e., bus and subway); (2) a significant impact of age on the switch from public transit to private car and two-wheelers; (3) more obvious changes in private car and public transportation modes in more developed cities. The findings from this study are expected to be useful for establishing partial and resilient policies and ensuring sustainable mobility and travel equality in the post-pandemic era.

The social confinement resulting from the COVID-19 crisis temporarily reduced greenhouse gas emissions. Although experts contend that the decrease in pollution rates was not drastic, some surveys detect growth in social concern about the climate. In this new climate-conscious environment, municipalities and local governments are promoting a new way of living and caring for cities, even before they can regain national and international freedom of movement. This work analyzes the connections between new climate awareness arising from the COVID-19 crisis, proposals of sustainable citizenship around the world, and its communication on Twitter to educate the new eco-conscious audience. The methodology mixes quantitative and qualitative analysis, using the Twitonomy Premium tool and the Twitter research tool with data extracted at the end of December 2020. Among the top ten most influential and active accounts, the results show educational institutions, local institutions, companies, neighborhoods, associations, and influencers. The impossibility of living in the city has not prevented citizen education and commitment to make real change for when that city and its citizens return to normality. However, this new normality must be different: more ecological, more responsible, more sustainable, and practiced from early childhood.

This research investigates the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on foreign direct investment. This research also studies the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the relationship between foreign direct investment (FDI) and the gross domestic product (GDP). This research employs a local projection estimation to calculate the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on foreign direct investment. The panel vector autoregression is applied to estimate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the relationship between FDI and GDP. This research finds variations in the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on FDI among economic sectors in Indonesia. Moreover, the relationship between FDI and GDP is affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.

This study examines the online teaching abilities and competencies needed to teach online courses in Saudi Arabia’s higher education system. As a result, the goal of this study was to examine and expand the technology acceptance model (TAM) to assess online teaching abilities and competences utilizing digital technologies in higher education during the COVID-19 epidemic. Therefore, it aimed to develop a new model to measure and explore critical factors that influence online teaching skills, competencies, and actual use of digital tools in higher education. The participants in the study were 350 lecturers at King Faisal University. The research data were analyzed using structural equation modeling (AMOS-SEM). The findings revealed that: (a) perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness on using digital tools during the COVID-19 pandemic has a direct positive impact on perceived teaching self-efficacy, perceived enjoyment, online teaching skills, and digital tools access; (b) perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness of using digital tools have a direct positive impact on lecturers’ attitude toward use and lecturers’ behavioral intention to use digital tools during the COVID-19 pandemic; and (c) perceived ease of use. As a consequence of the findings, a validated instrument was designed to assess and investigate crucial elements that impact lecturers’ real usage of digital technologies for teaching and learning in Saudi Arabia’s higher education.

In this study, we designed a structural model to determine the relationships among push–pull factors, institutional situations, and satisfaction during the COVID-19 pandemic. The 17 selected indicators fell under five domains, namely push factors, pull factors, institutional leadership, international strategies, and satisfaction. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to verify the assumptions of the model. Based on 1005 degree-seeking international students’ views, this study found that push and pull factors may coincidentally exist, and their functions can be modified by institutional situations. The findings suggested pull factors will, through institutional leadership, impact students’ satisfaction, while push factors will not. Moreover, the detection of institutional mediation can provide useful information for specific institutes to develop their future recruiting or retaining strategies. These findings enriched our knowledge of the field for higher education sustainable development. For future studies, this design may be useful to interpret the phenomena of global student mobility in higher education settings.

Environmental factors may operate differently when relations are measured across different geographical locations, a phenomenon known as spatial non-stationarity. This study investigates the spatial non-stationarity effect of unhealthy food environments and green spaces on the T2DM prevalence rate at the neighborhood level in Toronto. This study also compares how the results vary between age groups, classified as all adults (20 and above), young adults (from 20 to 44), middle adulthood (from 45 to 64), and seniors (65 and above). The geographically weighted regression model is utilized to explore the impacts of spatial non-stationarity effects on the research results, which may lead to biased conclusions, which have often been ignored in past studies. The results from this study reveal that environmental variables dissimilarly affect T2DM prevalence rates among different age groups and neighborhoods in Toronto after controlling for socioeconomic factors. For example, the green space density yields positive associations with diabetes prevalence rates for elder generations but negative relationships for younger age groups in twenty-two and four neighborhoods, respectively, around Toronto East. The observed associations will provide beneficial suggestions to support government and public health authorities in designing education, prevention, and intervention programs targeting different neighborhoods to control the burden of diabetes.

The lockdown and social distancing policies to reduce COVID-19 spread and perceived safety threats of COVID-19 significantly affected people’s travel behavior. Greece has been suffering from the COVID-19 pandemic, and people’s mobility behavior has been greatly affected. This study aims at: (1) exploring the variations in individuals’ trip frequencies by mode and purpose before and after the COVID-19 outbreak; (2) understanding the effects of individual differences (i.e., sociodemographic details) and perceptions towards COVID-19 (i.e., the perceived threats of COVID-19) on people’s mobility behavior changes after the outbreak; (3) underlining the individuals’ perceptions of the COVID-19 threat on the willingness of public transportation usage. Overall, 403 responses were collected in late 2020. A series of random parameter Probit modeling results reveal multiple individual and perception factors affecting the changes in mobility behavior in Greece. The results from structural equation modeling indicate that perceived COVID-19 threats affect the attitudes and subjective norms towards people’s intentions to use public transportation. The results from this study provide valuable insights for transportation authorities to develop effective strategies to manage traffic during the spread of disease for a possible future epidemic.