Evaluation of Daily Behaviors Related to Health Risks of the Ger Residents in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia
, Shigeo Nishikizawa 1 and Sonomdagva Chonokhuu 2Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
This paper addresses an interesting and important topic in terms of the pathways to health impacts from environmental pollution in communities heavily dependent on coal for heating. However there were some major issues with how the paper was presented that need to be addressed.
The most important is the Methods section. The Data Analysis section is made up of one short paragraph. We need to know much more detail about how multivariate analysis was carried out, as well as the PCA analysis.
Second is the results. The descriptive results are only presented in Table 1 and even here without any numbers of participants in various groups. Table 1 needs to describe the sample in much more detail.
Following that the next sections, exposure pathways, living conditions, health issues and social aspects are not tabulated at all. This is a major weakness for the paper. The reader needs to actually see the data, not just a paragraph summarising it.
More minor issues:
- Paragraph 1 - for the unfamiliar reader you need to describe what a Ger district is
- Line 68 - is that incidence a rate, or an overall number? Needs to be defined.
- 159-60 - need to describe more clearly why you are considering smoking here. It is unclear if you mean the general health risks of cigarettes, or the transfer of coal ash while putting hands near mouth
- 186-88 - you describe the main concerns of the residents but it is unclear what the actual issue is. For example 'schools' as a concern. Do you mean not enough schools? quality of schools? coal pollution at schools?
Author Response
Cover letter
Dear Reviewer
Thank you very much for the opportunity to revise our paper which was entitled ‘Evaluation of daily behaviors related to health risks of the Ger residents in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia’. The suggestions offered by you have been immensely helpful, and we also appreciate your insightful comments on revising the introduction, methodology and results, and conclusion of the paper.
We have included reviewers' comments immediately after this letter and responded to you individually, indicating exactly how we addressed each concern or problem and describing the changes we have made in the correction matrix. The changes are marked as yellow color in this paper, and the revised manuscript is attached to this system.
We hope the revised resubmission manuscript will better suit the special issue of Human Lifestyles and Behaviors. Sustainable Environments for Better Health, Quality of Life, and Wellbeing in the section of Health and Sustainability of Journal of Sustainability, but we are happy to consider further revisions and we thank you for your continued interest in our research.
In addition, this paper has been edited by an English proofing company after reviewed by you.
Please check the attached file.
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Correction matrix |
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№ |
Reviewers comments |
Authors correction |
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Reviewer form 1 |
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1. |
This paper addresses an interesting and important topic in terms of the pathways to health impacts from environmental pollution in communities heavily dependent on coal for heating. However there were some major issues with how the paper was presented that need to be addressed. |
Thank you very much for all of your important comment. |
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2. |
The most important is the Methods section. The Data Analysis section is made up of one short paragraph. We need to know much more detail about how multivariate analysis was carried out, as well as the PCA analysis.
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An additional paragraph of using PCA has been added in 2.3 Data analyses of methodology part. For example ‘Survey data generated 5 main sections in the questionnaire survey sheet, as mentioned earlier. The correlation between each family member (Section 1), and daily behavior and social aspects (other sections) was analyzed through PCA. The PCA used Varimax rotation and Kaiser normalization. After grouping in PCA, each factor identified the relationship between pairs of values by scattering using Excel to determine the correlation.’ |
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3. |
Second is the results. The descriptive results are only presented in Table 1 and even here without any numbers of participants in various groups. Table 1 needs to describe the sample in much more detail.
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The detailed information of participants in the questionnaire survey has been added. |
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4. |
Following that the next sections, exposure pathways, living conditions, health issues and social aspects are not tabulated at all. This is a major weakness for the paper. The reader needs to actually see the data, not just a paragraph summarising it. |
The detailed results of the questionnaire survey have been added by bar chart and explanation. Thank you very much for your comment. |
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5. |
Paragraph 1 - for the unfamiliar reader you need to describe what a Ger district is |
Thank you very much for your comment. It is right. I had omitted the explanation of Ger. It has been included in the abstract. For example ‘The capital city in Mongolia comprises two types of dwellings: apartments and Gers. The Ger is a traditional Mongolian house. |
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6. |
Line 68 - is that incidence a rate, or an overall number? Needs to be defined. |
It was the number of cases. Therefore the incidence word has been changed by cases. For example, ‘….In 2016, Mongolia reported 38,699 cases of respiratory infections, which is the highest number recorded over the last five years [25]’. |
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7. |
159-60 - need to describe more clearly why you are considering smoking here. It is unclear if you mean the general health risks of cigarettes, or the transfer of coal ash while putting hands near mouth |
This sentence has been added and revised. For examples ‘Considering smoke is one of the main sources of heavy metals from hand to mouth in ger residents. This question tried to explain the ingestion pathway related to contaminated soil, not about the toxicity of smoke to human health’.... …. ‘It means, if they smoke after contact with contaminated soil, it is one of the main sources of heavy metals by ingestion pathway from the contaminated soil’. |
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8. |
186-88 - you describe the main concerns of the residents but it is unclear what the actual issue is. For example 'schools' as a concern. Do you mean not enough schools? quality of schools? coal pollution at schools? | The more explanations of school has been added. For examples, ‘In addition, the primary school is less in ger districts. Most of their school is located too far from their home. Some of them arrive at their school at least 1 kilometer to 2 kilometers by foot. Also, the duration of their stay at school is limited for them due to the lack of capacity at the school. After 3-5 hours, they must go back to their home. It is the most pressure issue for children. However, it is only concerned about 4 percent because there are many problems in ger area than lack of school’. |
Author Response File: 
Author Response.docx
Reviewer 2 Report
Thank you for the opportunity to review your paper. This is very interesting work and important to public health in Mongolia.
Abstract: I think it could be clearer that you are reporting survey results. For example: "Survey results indicate that residents store the coal ash in packing bags..."
Introduction: there are corrections that need to be made with the citations in lines 31, 33, 34. There are also various grammar mistakes in this section. In line 68, indicate the year of the infections reported.
Methods: It would be helpful to explain where the soil samples were collected in the previous study (and reference this study properly).
Discussion: In this section, compare to results of similar studies in the literature. I find that this section is reporting of results with little discussion in context of the literature.
Author Response
Cover letter
Dear Reviewer
Thank you very much for the opportunity to revise our paper which was entitled ‘Evaluation of daily behaviors related to health risks of the Ger residents in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia’. The suggestions offered by you have been immensely helpful, and we also appreciate your insightful comments on revising the introduction, methodology and results, and conclusion of the paper.
We have included reviewer comments immediately after this letter and responded to you individually, indicating exactly how we addressed each concern or problem and describing the changes we have made in the correction matrix. The changes are marked as yellow color in this paper, and the revised manuscript is attached to this system.
We hope the revised resubmission manuscript will better suit the special issue of Human Lifestyles and Behaviors. Sustainable Environments for Better Health, Quality of Life, and Wellbeing in the section of Health and Sustainability of Journal of Sustainability, but we are happy to consider further revisions and we thank you for your continued interest in our research.
In addition, this paper has been edited by an English proofing company after reviewed by you.
Please check the attached file.
|
Reviewer form 1 |
||
|
Correction matrix |
||
|
№ |
Reviewer comments |
Authors correction |
|
1. |
Thank you for the opportunity to review your paper. This is very interesting work and important to public health in Mongolia. |
Thank you very much for all of your important comment. |
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2. |
Abstract: I think it could be clearer that you are reporting survey results. For example: "Survey results indicate that residents store the coal ash in packing bags..." |
Thank you very much for making clearer sentences. It has been added. |
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3. |
Introduction: there are corrections that need to be made with the citations in lines 31, 33, 34. There are also various grammar mistakes in this section. In line 68, indicate the year of the infections reported. |
All of as mentioned comments have been corrected. Thank you |
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4. |
Methods: It would be helpful to explain where the soil samples were collected in the previous study (and reference this study properly). |
Collected soil sample sites were added for the introduction part details and it was cited in the methodology part. The following paragraph has been added in the introduction part. For example; ‘In our previous work, potential human health studies were performed based on the concentration of heavy metals in the samples collected from 42 sites in the Ger area of Ulaanbaatar city, Mongolia. In total, 28 heavy metals were identified using the ICP-OES and ICP-MS methods [15]. The carcinogenic risk was estimated to exceed the permissible limit for both adults and children at all of the sample sites. The total estimated non-carcinogenic risk exceeded the permissible limit or exceeded 1 at all of the sample sites, especially for children. Therefore, it is necessary to identify their daily behaviors in relation to contaminated soil’. |
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5. |
Discussion: In this section, compare to results of similar studies in the literature. I find that this section is reporting of results with little discussion in the context of the literature. |
Thank you very much for your important comments. compare to results of the same issue in the literature has been discussed and added in results and discussion part. For example,… ‘Previous studies by Byambadorj, et al. [3] and Nakao et al. [4] mentioned the same issues concerning health over the duration of winter. Moreover, So et al. reported Ger residents taking off their shoes when they came inside. As mentioned in these results, some of them tried to wash the dust off their shoes when they came into the Ger. This could also have worsened their health issues as they wore the same set of shoes both in and outside of the Ger, and most of the roads in the Ger district in Ulaanbaatar are unpaved [5]’. |
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
I am happy now. My comments have all been addressed.
