The effects of the COVID-19 pandemic period on stock market return and volatility. Evidence from the Pakistan Stock Exchange

Baixiang Wang; Muhammad Waris; Katarzyna Adamiak; Mohammad Adnan; Hawkar Anwer Hamad; Saad Mahmood Bhatti

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0295853

Peer Review History

Original SubmissionAugust 29, 2023
29 Aug 2023 Author Response Attachments Attachment Submitted filename: Response to Reviewer and Editor.docx https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0295853.r001
4 Oct 2023 Decision Letter - Syed Usman Qadri, Editor PONE-D-23-27788The effects of the COVID-19 pandemic period on stock market return and volatility. Evidence from the Pakistan Stock ExchangePLOS ONE Dear Dr. Waris, Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process. The topic is interesting, but the authors need to address the reviewers concerns with the following comments:1. If COVID-19 has an impact globally on every economy, then why do you need to analyse the impact on the Pakistani economy?Explain the research gap in the introduction section.2. There are many other factors affecting the stock market during the analysis period; how did you statistically control these factors in your analysis?3. There are a lot of grammatical mistakes in the manuscript; English proofreading is required.4. The introduction needs to be revised properly according to your core idea.5. There is a lack of literature regarding the Pakistani economy and the COVID-19 pandemic. Include the following and other more updated literature on the Pakistani economy. DOI:10.3389/fpubh.2022.10554067. 6. The conclusion section must be separated and include policy implications, limitations, and the future of the study separately.. Be sure to: Please submit your revised manuscript by Nov 18 2023 11:59PM. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at plosone@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file. 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The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented. Reviewer #1: Partly Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: No ******** 2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? Reviewer #1: No Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: Yes ****** 3. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available? The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. 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(Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters) Reviewer #1: ABSTRACT To assess the impact on what? The author stated the objective which was to investigate………………. In the same abstract it was stated to assess the impact of what ?...............on what?..... Please complete the abstract with the impact you are determining. There are several grammatical errors in the abstract, please rewrite. For example ‘Our E-GARCH findings shows (show) that there is long-term persistent (persistence or persistent –‘…’) in the return volatility of the stock market of the Pakistan in the period of the COVID-19 timeline. The authors should be more elaborate in what the study advocated to the different stakeholders stated in the abstract because investors, policymakers, government, and regulators have different information need. INTRODUCTION The introduction has different styles of in-text referencing. The authors should stick to one or follow the journal’s requirement. There are several assertions without any sort of references therefore making it difficult to refer. The authors kept stating, ‘the study can’. The study is either investigating or not, it is not a conjecture. You are advised to use editing services or review appropriately. DATA ANALYSIS The WHO collects data from the National Health Services, what informs the use of WHO data than that of the Pakistani National Health Department? How does the WHO confirm the data? The authors can add those details to make a case for using WHO data than that from Pakistan Health Department. ‘The risk is measured through the dispersions in the return of the stock markets and fluctuate due to the daily cases of the pandemics (Andersen & Nielsen, 2011)’ The above statement and the reference present a fundamental error since COVID-19 started in 2020, and this is consistent in the study presenting a clear case of inappropriate referencing. What is the nature of the data collected from the WHO? In the objective, the authors stated ‘Investigate influence of daily COVID-19 cases on the volatility of the Pakistan stock market returns’ Therefore it is expected to see daily data multiplied by the period (duration) thus from March…….. Also this must be justified…… CONCLUSIONS What is the research impact? What are the research variables? Readers do not need to figure out the above items, it must be explicit and clear from the research objectives for consistency. Reviewer #2: Dear authors, Greetings and thank you for your efforts in preparing this paper. However, few comments can enhance it: 1- Authors should add recommendation/s to the abstract. 2- The introduction of your study is very clear and clearly expresses your study concerns. But your study introduction is really very long for a paper (5 pages) to understand the issue. Authors must give brief. This is not a book. 3- The aim of literature usually is to provide summary on where the previous studies have reached and then what is the justification of your study. However, very few studies in literature have been conducted during the pandemic period. Authors should focus on the studies conducted during the pandemic period and increase it as well. 4- Add sources to all tables and figures. 5- Authors should support their study findings with some previous studies results. This will enhance your results and therefore your study. 6- In page 23 you explained what some letters mean such as LR and HQ in the statistics. Authors should do the same for all the similar in the other tables in particular unknown letters. 7- References should be mainly from the last 5 years. too many references are very old. All the best, Reviewer #3: This study deals with a series of very important topics: The effects of the COVID-19 pandemic period on stock market return and volatility. Evidence from the Pakistan Stock Exchange. Unfortunately, the paper reveals several deficiencies requiring an in-depth review and major revision before submission. The following suggestions are provided below with the hope that the author will consider including them in future submissions. 1.The abstract should embody both clarity and conciseness. 2.The introduction of this article should provide a comprehensive assessment of the performance of the Pakistan Stock Exchange during the COVID-19 pandemic. It is imperative to include scholarly references alongside this review to maintain consistency between the declared study aims and the methodological framework utilized. The writers are expected to offer a comprehensive contextualization of the research and try to clarify how the publication's findings contribute to the current academic knowledge base, thereby improving our understanding of the subject matter significantly. 3.In the introduction section, the objective of the paper presented need more clarifications to suit reader to understand the main idea of the paper. 4.The literature review draws heavily on a few sources, which could mean that more research needs to be done. The credibility of the literature review would be improved by adding more current citations from different authors and publications. The literature review doesn't have any critical analysis or talk about the studies' strengths and flaws. If the existing literature's pros and cons were discussed, the study landscape would look more balanced. 5.Some of the paper needs to be include in the literature review. 1.Qadri, S. U., Raza, M., Qadri, S., Mahmood, S., Ye, C., Rauf, F., ... & Hossain, M. S. (2023). Overflow Effect of COVID-19 Pandemic on Stock Market Performance: A Study Based on Growing Economy. Discrete Dynamics in Nature and Society, 2023. 2.Aamir, M., Khan, N., Naeem, M., Bilal, M., Khan, F., & Abdullah, S. (2023). Implications of the COVID-19 pandemic on the shanghai, New York, and Pakistan stock exchanges. Heliyon, e17525. 3.Qadri, S., Chen, S., Qadri, S.U., Bukhari, W.N. (2023). Cultural Challenges in the Implementation of COVID-19 Public Health Measures. In: Yang, Z. (eds) Environmental Science and Technology: Sustainable Development. ICEST 2022. Environmental Science and Engineering. Springer, Cham. 6.The research method needs to Cleary justified. How the data sampling can be valid or justified? 7.You take data from March 15, 2020, to March 31, 2021; why not include more recent data to make your findings more comprehensive and general? 8.Why are you not including a discussion section? Add a section (Discussion) and compare your results to those of other studies. 9.In conclusion, while the article has its merits, certain aspects require refinement and expansion to ensure a clearer and more comprehensive presentation of the topic. 10.policy implications should be according to the results 11.Write properly study limitations and future direction. ****** 6. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files. If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public. Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy. 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Attachments Attachment Submitted filename: Comments file.docx https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0295853.r002
Revision 1
18 Nov 2023 Author Response Dear Editor: We really appreciate you taking the time to offer us your comments and insights related to our manuscript. Thank you for arranging a review of our manuscript " The effects of the COVID-19 pandemic period on stock market return and volatility. Evidence from the Pakistan Stock Exchange". The authors are honored to receive valuable comments from both reviewers. We have carefully followed the reviewers' requests for detailed answers to questions and have carefully revised the article's structure, content and language. All report changes have been highlighted in yellow, green and Blue. We appreciate your suggestions. The revised paper is more informative, the language is more fluent, and the readers can get more valuable information. Once again, thank you sincerely for your help. I am pleased to resubmit for publication the revised version of the manuscript “The effects of the COVID-19 pandemic period on stock market return and volatility. Evidence from the Pakistan Stock Exchange” We appreciated the editor's and the reviewers' constructive criticisms. We have carefully studied your valuable comments. The senior editor and reviewers, we tried our best to revise the manuscript. The point-to-point response to the reviewer’s comments are listed as follows: Reviewer #1: ABSTRACT To assess the impact on what? The author stated the objective which was to investigate………………. In the same abstract it was stated to assess the impact of what ?...............on what?..... Please complete the abstract with the impact you are determining. There are several grammatical errors in the abstract, please rewrite. For example ‘Our E-GARCH findings shows (show) that there is long-term persistent (persistence or persistent –‘…’) in the return volatility of the stock market of the Pakistan in the period of the COVID-19 timeline. The authors should be more elaborate in what the study advocated to the different stakeholders stated in the abstract because investors, policymakers, government, and regulators have different information need. Response to Reviewer: The abstract developed according to the reviewer suggestion as “The COVID-19 pandemic has emerged as a significant event of the current century, introducing substantial transformations in economic and social activities worldwide. The primary objective of this study is to investigate the relationship between daily COVID-19 cases and Pakistan stock market (PSX) return volatility. To assess the relationship between daily COVID-19 cases and the PSX return volatility, we collected secondary data from the World Health Organization (WHO) and the PSX website, specifically focusing on the PSX 100 index, spanning from March 15, 2020, to March 31, 2021. We used the GARCH family models for measuring the volatility and the COVID-19 impact on the stock market performance. Our E-GARCH findings show that there is long-term persistence in the return volatility of the stock market of Pakistan in the period of the COVID-19 timeline because ARCH alpha (ω1) and GARCH beta (ω2) are significant. Moreover, is asymmetrical effect is found in the stock market of Pakistan during the COVID-19 period due to Gamma (ѱ) being significant for PSX. Our DCC-GARCH results show that the COVID-19 active cases have a long-term spillover impact on the Pakistan stock market. Therefore, the need of strong planning and alternative platform should be needed in the distress period to promote the stock market and investor should advised to make diversified international portfolio by investing in high and low volatility stock market to save their income. This study advocated the implications for investors to invest in low volatility stock especially during the period of pandemics to protect their return on investment. Moreover, policy makers and the regulators can make effective policies to maintain financial stability during pandemics that is very important for the country’s economic development.” The yellow highlights show the changes in the manuscript Abstract section. Moreover all grammatical mistakes were removed. INTRODUCTION The introduction has different styles of in-text referencing. The authors should stick to one or follow the journal’s requirement. There are several assertions without any sort of references therefore making it difficult to refer. The authors kept stating, ‘the study can’. The study is either investigating or not, it is not a conjecture. You are advised to use editing services or review appropriately. Response to Reviewer: The in-tax references make correct in the introduction section. All the assertions are cited with latest references. The abstract proofread done. DATA ANALYSIS The WHO collects data from the National Health Services, what informs the use of WHO data than that of the Pakistani National Health Department? How does the WHO confirm the data? The authors can add those details to make a case for using WHO data than that from Pakistan Health Department. ‘The risk is measured through the dispersions in the return of the stock markets and fluctuate due to the daily cases of the pandemics (Andersen & Nielsen, 2011)’ The above statement and the reference present a fundamental error since COVID-19 started in 2020, and this is consistent in the study presenting a clear case of inappropriate referencing. What is the nature of the data collected from the WHO? In the objective, the authors stated ‘Investigate influence of daily COVID-19 cases on the volatility of the Pakistan stock market returns’ Therefore it is expected to see daily data multiplied by the period (duration) thus from March…….. Also this must be justified…… Response to Reviewer: The accuracy of the data source corrected according to the suggestions as, “To explore the impact of COVID-19 period on stock market volatility, we used the secondary data extracted from World health organization (WHO) website (https://www.who.int/data/collections) and index data provided by the Pakistan stock exchange on their website (https://dps.psx.com.pk/) for the period 15th of the March 2020 to 31st March 2021. The World health organization has regional offices around the world and these offices support the national health structure in different ways. In Pakistan, world health organization worked with coordinating to the Ministry of national health services regulation and Coordination (NHSRC) to support the health facilities within Pakistan. The National command and control authority (NCCA) collect the data and monitor throughout Pakistan and provide to NHSRC. The NHRC communicates the data to the WHO for better health discussion. According to Allan et al. (2022) that the WHO collects the data through their regional offices from the respected country health system. The data of the COVID-19 and the stock market index are collected on a daily frequency basis. Therefore, 382 total observations were used in the analysis.” The yellow highlight at page 8 shows the track changes. The risk measurement reference corrected according to suggestions (page 8-9 shows the track changes). The nature of the data and the total observation justification are given. CONCLUSIONS What is the research impact? What are the research variables? Readers do not need to figure out the above items, it must be explicit and clear from the research objectives for consistency. Response to Reviewer: The research objectives and their relationship are explained in the conclusion section with each variable directions and relationship. The consistency should be kept in mind throughout the manuscript writing. Thank You Reviewer #2: Dear authors, Greetings and thank you for your efforts in preparing this paper. However, few comments can enhance it: 1- Authors should add recommendation/s to the abstract. Response to Reviewer: The recommendations added in the abstract according to suggestion as “Therefore, the need of strong planning and alternative platform should be needed in the distress period to promote the stock market and investor should advised to make diversified international portfolio by investing in high and low volatility stock market to save their income.” The green highlighted shows the track changes in Abstract section. 2- The introduction of your study is very clear and clearly expresses your study concerns. But your study introduction is really very long for a paper (5 pages) to understand the issue. Authors must give brief. This is not a book. Response to Reviewer: The introduction make more accurate at 3 page only. 3- The aim of literature usually is to provide summary on where the previous studies have reached and then what is the justification of your study. However, very few studies in literature have been conducted during the pandemic period. Authors should focus on the studies conducted during the pandemic period and increase it as well. Response to Reviewer: The pandemic COVID-19 studies included in the literature review with extracting the gap in the literature that justified the study objective. 4- Add sources to all tables and figures. Response to Reviewer: All the tables and Figure are sourced properly. The green highlight at end of each table and figure shows the track changes. 5- Authors should support their study findings with some previous studies results. This will enhance your results and therefore your study. Response to Reviewer: In the discussion section the findings are justified with relation to previous studies. Moreover the green highlights show the changes in discussion portion. 6- In page 23 you explained what some letters mean such as LR and HQ in the statistics. Authors should do the same for all the similar in the other tables in particular unknown letters. Response to Reviewer: The LR and HQ are defined properly and same type of other mistakes removed. “According to the Abbas, Ahmad-Zaluki, and Mehmood (2023) that the lag selection should be done based on Schwarz information criterion (SC) and Hannan-Quinn information criterion (HQ), when both parameters are significant at same point and less lag is suitable for the accurate result 7- References should be mainly from the last 5 years. too many references are very old. All the best, Response to Reviewer: The latest references added in the manuscript by removing the old one. Thank you. Reviewer #3: This study deals with a series of very important topics: The effects of the COVID-19 pandemic period on stock market return and volatility. Evidence from the Pakistan Stock Exchange. Unfortunately, the paper reveals several deficiencies requiring an in-depth review and major revision before submission. The following suggestions are provided below with the hope that the author will consider including them in future submissions. 1. The abstract should embody both clarity and conciseness. Response to Reviewer: The abstract makes more concise and clearer. Please find page 1 of Abstract. 2.The introduction of this article should provide a comprehensive assessment of the performance of the Pakistan Stock Exchange during the COVID-19 pandemic. It is imperative to include scholarly references alongside this review to maintain consistency between the declared study aims and the methodological framework utilized. The writers are expected to offer a comprehensive contextualization of the research and try to clarify how the publication's findings contribute to the current academic knowledge base, thereby improving our understanding of the subject matter significantly. Response to Reviewer: The introduction makes stronger according to the suggestions of the reviewer. All the reference are added where needed and consistency is kept in Mind in Introduction writing. 3.In the introduction section, the objective of the paper presented need more clarifications to suit reader to understand the main idea of the paper. Response to Reviewer: The objectives are clearly defined according to the reviewer suggestion as “The stock market volatility gives significance to the change in the business operations environment (Liang, Umar, Ma, & Huynh, 2022) and hence it is an interesting problem for the investigations and provides a significant research gap for investigation in emerging economy such as Pakistan. Specifically, the first aims of this study are to investigate how the COVID-19 pandemic has affected stock market return volatility in Pakistan. Therefore, this study uses the historical stock market data to examine the patterns and changes in volatility during the COVID-19 period. This study also utilized various quantitative techniques and models to measure and assess stock market volatility, such as GARCH models or other volatility forecasting approaches, but previous study has the insufficient methodological approaches to estimate the volatility in spite of measuring the linear relationship between them. The second objective is to investigate the news impact of the COVID-19 that may fluctuate the stock market return of Pakistan. Thirds aims is to investigate the spillover impact of the COVID-19 on the stock market return and volatility. Moreover, this study also provides the new insight about the volatility pattern in Pakistan with uniqueness or similarities of the pandemic's impact on stock market volatility with respect to existing literature.” 4.The literature review draws heavily on a few sources, which could mean that more research needs to be done. The credibility of the literature review would be improved by adding more current citations from different authors and publications. The literature review doesn't have any critical analysis or talk about the studies' strengths and flaws. If the existing literature's pros and cons were discussed, the study landscape would look more balanced. Response to Reviewer: The literature review make more strong according to the suggestion and included the latest studies that justified our objectives. The previous studies pros and cons are discussed with extracting gap in literature. 5.Some of the paper needs to be include in the literature review. 1.Qadri, S. U., Raza, M., Qadri, S., Mahmood, S., Ye, C., Rauf, F., ... & Hossain, M. S. (2023). Overflow Effect of COVID-19 Pandemic on Stock Market Performance: A Study Based on Growing Economy. Discrete Dynamics in Nature and Society, 2023. 2.Aamir, M., Khan, N., Naeem, M., Bilal, M., Khan, F., & Abdullah, S. (2023). Implications of the COVID-19 pandemic on the shanghai, New York, and Pakistan stock exchanges. Heliyon, e17525. 3.Qadri, S., Chen, S., Qadri, S.U., Bukhari, W.N. (2023). Cultural Challenges in the Implementation of COVID-19 Public Health Measures. In: Yang, Z. (eds) Environmental Science and Technology: Sustainable Development. ICEST 2022. Environmental Science and Engineering. Springer, Cham. Response to Reviewer: These studies are cited with proper referencing as “Fama, Fisher, Jensen, and Roll (1969) conducted a study to investigate the share market prices are related to specific events and found the significant relationship between them. According to S. U. Qadri et al. (2023) that the COVID-19 has significant negative and positive impact on the performance of organizations, and they also concluded that some companies maintained their sustainability even though most of the firms suffered from the pandemic. Moreover, Aamir et al. (2023) investigated the impact on the COVID-19 on the three different stock markets belong to different region such as Pakistan, China and the USA and found the significant negative relationship between the COVID-19 and stock market. They also concluded that the lockdown in the economy also decreased the stock market performance of the country. S. Qadri, Chen, Qadri, and Bukhari (2022) also investigated the consequence of the COVID-19 in Pakistan at different time period and concluded the cultural challenges during the COVID-19 policy control. Therefore, these studies provide a significant gap in the literature about the stock market volatility pattern during the period of pandemic.” 6.The research method needs to Cleary justified. How the data sampling can be valid or justified? Response to Reviewer: The research method properly explained with the variables and the sample are also justified. Please refer to page 8 and blue highlighted. 7.You take data from March 15, 2020, to March 31, 2021; why not include more recent data to make your findings more comprehensive and general? Response to Reviewer: The data selection reason are properly written as “The data sample selected time period is the main domain of the analysis because it covers the initial boom and the declining phase of the pandemic. Moreover, after 31 March 2021 the cases of the COVID-19 reduced to their lowest range. Pakistan stock market is selected on the phenomenon of the cultural aspect different from other emerging economies that already faced different difficulties such as political instability and the economic downfall from the last decades. While the other emerging as well as the developed economies should maintain their economic position in during the pandemics by conducting their business activities through online platform but due to lack of the resources Pakistan faced difficulties and sustain on the IMF programs.” 8.Why are you not including a discussion section? Add a section (Discussion) and compare your results to those of other studies. Response to Reviewer: The discussion section added and findings are compared with previous studies. The blue highlights in the discussion section at page 19-20 shows the track changes. 9.In conclusion, while the article has its merits, certain aspects require refinement and expansion to ensure a clearer and more comprehensive presentation of the topic. Response to Reviewer: In conclusion the objective and conclusion properly expanded with its merits. Page 20-21 shows the track changes in blue highlight. 10.policy implications should be according to the results Response to Reviewer: The implications added properly and according to the study as “The study has several implications for investors, government and policy makers. Investors can manage their risk taking the volatility pattern of the respected country in mind. The volatility and spillover are useful for the investor to keep in mind while making the internationally diversified portfolio for getting the expected rate of return especially in the distress time period. This study is also helpful for investors to raise investor confidence by seeing the pattern of the volatility in the period of the pandemic. Generally, investors prefer low volatility stock during the distress period and like high volatility stock at normal period (Hanif, Teplova, Rodina, Alomari, & Mensi, 2023). The study also provides implications for policymakers about the effectiveness of various policy interventions implemented during the pandemic to stabilize the stock market. Governments and regulatory bodies can assess the impact of fiscal and monetary policies, market regulations, and stimulus measures on market volatility. The findings can guide policymakers in formulating appropriate measures to support the market and investor confidence during future crises. Understanding the differential impacts of the pandemic on various sectors of the Pakistan Stock Exchange can have implications for investors, industry participants, and policymakers.” 11.Write properly to study limitations and future direction. Response to Reviewer: The limitations and future research suggestion included as “To analyzing the effect of the COVID-19 on all Asian and OECD economy is the difficult task due to the limitations and open the door for the new insight for further research to investigate on all Asian and OECD economy for different culture comparison. Moreover, pre-and post- pandemic behavior of volatility should be the future research topic for investigation especially in the merging economy where every country struggles to increase their economic sustainability. Future research may be conducted on the different economic indicators such as inflation, interest rate, unemployment and government expenditure should be included with COVID-19 cases for getting volatility pattern. Moreover, governance mechanism in the country may contribute in raising the effects of the pandemic on the stock market return, it may be investigated in future research topic.” Thank You Attachments Attachment Submitted filename: responce to reviewer points.docx https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0295853.r003
30 Nov 2023 Decision Letter - Syed Usman Qadri, Editor The effects of the COVID-19 pandemic period on stock market return and volatility. Evidence from the Pakistan Stock Exchange PONE-D-23-27788R1 Dear Dr. Waris, We’re pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been judged scientifically suitable for publication and will be formally accepted for publication once it meets all outstanding technical requirements. Within one week, you’ll receive an e-mail detailing the required amendments. When these have been addressed, you’ll receive a formal acceptance letter and your manuscript will be scheduled for publication. An invoice for payment will follow shortly after the formal acceptance. To ensure an efficient process, please log into Editorial Manager at http://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/, click the 'Update My Information' link at the top of the page, and double check that your user information is up-to-date. If you have any billing related questions, please contact our Author Billing department directly at authorbilling@plos.org. If your institution or institutions have a press office, please notify them about your upcoming paper to help maximize its impact. If they’ll be preparing press materials, please inform our press team as soon as possible -- no later than 48 hours after receiving the formal acceptance. Your manuscript will remain under strict press embargo until 2 pm Eastern Time on the date of publication. For more information, please contact onepress@plos.org. Kind regards, Syed Usman Qadri, PhD Academic Editor PLOS ONE Additional Editor Comments (optional): Reviewers' comments: Reviewer's Responses to Questions Comments to the Author 1. If the authors have adequately addressed your comments raised in a previous round of review and you feel that this manuscript is now acceptable for publication, you may indicate that here to bypass the “Comments to the Author” section, enter your conflict of interest statement in the “Confidential to Editor” section, and submit your "Accept" recommendation. Reviewer #2: All comments have been addressed Reviewer #3: (No Response) ******** 2. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented. Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: Yes ****** 3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: Yes ****** 4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available? The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified. Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: Yes ****** 5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English? PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here. Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: Yes ****** 6. Review Comments to the Author Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters) Reviewer #2: Dear authors, It is immensely appreciated that each comment has been thoroughly addressed and taken into consideration. Wishing you all the best, Reviewer #3: (No Response) ****** 7. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files. If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public. Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy. Reviewer #2: No Reviewer #3: Yes: Dr.Shahid Mahmood ******** https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0295853.r004
Formally Accepted
28 Jan 2024 Acceptance Letter - Syed Usman Qadri, Editor PONE-D-23-27788R1 PLOS ONE Dear Dr. Waris, I'm pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been deemed suitable for publication in PLOS ONE. Congratulations! Your manuscript is now being handed over to our production team. At this stage, our production department will prepare your paper for publication. This includes ensuring the following: * All references, tables, and figures are properly cited * All relevant supporting information is included in the manuscript submission, * There are no issues that prevent the paper from being properly typeset If revisions are needed, the production department will contact you directly to resolve them. If no revisions are needed, you will receive an email when the publication date has been set. At this time, we do not offer pre-publication proofs to authors during production of the accepted work. Please keep in mind that we are working through a large volume of accepted articles, so please give us a few weeks to review your paper and let you know the next and final steps. Lastly, if your institution or institutions have a press office, please let them know about your upcoming paper now to help maximize its impact. If they'll be preparing press materials, please inform our press team within the next 48 hours. Your manuscript will remain under strict press embargo until 2 pm Eastern Time on the date of publication. For more information, please contact onepress@plos.org. If we can help with anything else, please email us at customercare@plos.org. Thank you for submitting your work to PLOS ONE and supporting open access. Kind regards, PLOS ONE Editorial Office Staff on behalf of Dr. Syed Usman Qadri Academic Editor PLOS ONE https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0295853.r005

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