PONE-D-24-01799Food safety practices of individuals before and after the emergence of COVID-19: a pre and post comparative analysisPLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Gebeyehu,

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.

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Please submit your revised manuscript by Sep 21 2024 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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We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

Werku Etafa

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Journal requirements:

When submitting your revision, we need you to address these additional requirements.

1. Please ensure that your manuscript meets PLOS ONE's style requirements, including those for file naming. The PLOS ONE style templates can be found at

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Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. 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 #1: Partly

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2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #1: Yes

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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. 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 #1: Yes

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4. 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 #1: Yes

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5. 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 #1: 1. much volume of result narration at the abstract section, better to reduce

2. From January 2020 to December 2023 is only three years not four years

3. Better to include non-response rate in the methodology section

4. How the 10th food buyer in each open market is selected?

5. Operationally define what 'open market' is.

6. How can ' Language" be a barrier in study? Why not translate to different local languages?

7. There are sample size fallacies as 385 in the methodology part and 396 in the result section.

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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 .

Reviewer #1: Yes:  Yohannes Shumet Yimer

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PONE-D-24-01799R1Food safety practices of individuals before and after the emergence of COVID-19: a pre and post comparative analysisPLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Gebeyehu,

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.

Please submit your revised manuscript by Dec 20 2024 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.

Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:

• A rebuttal letter that responds to each point raised by the academic editor and reviewer(s). You should upload this letter as a separate file labeled 'Response to Reviewers'.
• A marked-up copy of your manuscript that highlights changes made to the original version. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Revised Manuscript with Track Changes'.
• An unmarked version of your revised paper without tracked changes. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Manuscript'.

If you would like to make changes to your financial disclosure, please include your updated statement in your cover letter. Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter.

If applicable, we recommend that you deposit your laboratory protocols in protocols.io to enhance the reproducibility of your results. Protocols.io assigns your protocol its own identifier (DOI) so that it can be cited independently in the future. For instructions see: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/submission-guidelines#loc-laboratory-protocols . Additionally, PLOS ONE offers an option for publishing peer-reviewed Lab Protocol articles, which describe protocols hosted on protocols.io. Read more information on sharing protocols at https://plos.org/protocols?utm_medium=editorial-email&utm_source=authorletters&utm_campaign=protocols .

We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

Adera Debella Kebede, MSC

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

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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

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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

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3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #2: Yes

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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

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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

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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,

Thank you for your valuable contribution to the understanding of food safety practices before and after the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly in the Ethiopian context. The manuscript is well-researched, and the findings are significant for public health interventions. Below is a summary of my feedback based on the review:

1. Technical Soundness & Data Validity:

Suggestions:

Clarify some of the more technical statistical terms for non-expert readers, such as "Wald X²" and "dummy variables." Brief explanations could help make the analysis more accessible to a wider audience.

2. Presentation and Language:

Simplify some of the longer sentences and correct minor punctuation errors to enhance clarity.

Ensure consistency in formatting numerical data and percentages.

3. Conclusion & Recommendations:

Consider expanding on how your findings can be integrated into national food safety policies or education programs. This could strengthen the practical implications of your research.

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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: Yes:  A Alyafei

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[NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.]

While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/ . PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org . Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step.

PONE-D-24-01799R2Food safety practices of individuals before and after the emergence of COVID-19: a pre and post comparative analysisPLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Gebeyehu,

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.

Please submit your revised manuscript by Apr 06 2025 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.

Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:

• A rebuttal letter that responds to each point raised by the academic editor and reviewer(s). You should upload this letter as a separate file labeled 'Response to Reviewers'.
• A marked-up copy of your manuscript that highlights changes made to the original version. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Revised Manuscript with Track Changes'.
• An unmarked version of your revised paper without tracked changes. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Manuscript'.

If you would like to make changes to your financial disclosure, please include your updated statement in your cover letter. Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter.

If applicable, we recommend that you deposit your laboratory protocols in protocols.io to enhance the reproducibility of your results. Protocols.io assigns your protocol its own identifier (DOI) so that it can be cited independently in the future. For instructions see: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/submission-guidelines#loc-laboratory-protocols . Additionally, PLOS ONE offers an option for publishing peer-reviewed Lab Protocol articles, which describe protocols hosted on protocols.io. Read more information on sharing protocols at https://plos.org/protocols?utm_medium=editorial-email&utm_source=authorletters&utm_campaign=protocols .

We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

Adera Debella Kebede, MSC

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Additional Editor Comments:

Title: Food safety practices of individuals before and after the emergence of COVID-19: a pre- and post-comparative analysis

This study explores “Food safety practices of individuals before and after the emergence of COVID-19: a pre- and post-comparative analysis The authors have done a commendable job, and I congratulate them. I have some critical comments and some questions for the authors, which, if addressed, will increase the readability and understandability of the manuscript. I have put it section by section for ease of communication

Methods :

1. Please include the study period ( the same comments need to be incorporated in the section of methods also)

2. line 19: You have mentioned ….”three regional (Dessie, Kombolcha, and Debre Birhan) cities of Ethiopia” … it is crystal clear these are a pocket area in Amhara reginal state. Thus, you have state this as (Amhara Reginal State (Dessie, Kombolcha, and Debre Birhan)

3. line 21: you have stated that …”An equal number of participants were surveyed from metropolitan and regional cities”….why an equal number ? Have you assured the representativeness of the sample ?How you choose the food shops ?

4. Which software used for data entry and analysis should be indicated and when you declare statistical significance should be clearly mentioned

Result: change this to <Results >

Conclusion : should be <conclusions > and the conclusion should be based only on the current study findings, according to your study objective. Don’t put general ideas and common sense here. All the recommendations should align with your study findings.

Conceptual model :

1. Line 61: Fig 1: “Concept map of COVID-19’s impact on food safety and its indirect impact on health based on the findings of previous studies”……have a citation as you have taken from finding of previous studies

MATERIALS AND METHODS:

1 Generally. Reporting guidelines: Please ensure you follow the appropriate reporting guidelines when preparing your manuscript and submit the completed checklist as supplementary material. Please state in the methods which guidelines were consulted when preparing the manuscript. More information on reporting guidelines can be found on the EQUATOR website

2 Study design, sample size, and sampling procedure

3 The study seems that community type of study, if that is case why don’t use a design effect in calculating the sample size ?

4 If you said that , individuals were selected using random sampling methods ..How you create the sampling frame both for individuals and included open air market

5 Line 119-121: you have mentioned that …..”As the data collection was not self-administered and was conducted in face-to-face interviews by trained data collectors, ultimately there were no non-respondent participants in the survey. The researchers had expected a 3% non-response rate and therefore the total sample collected, including the expected nonresponse rate” ……I have afraid of non-response rate of 3% , you chose ? what if an individual’s withdraw in middle of data collection ? once agreed to fill and refuse to participate ? what if selected individuals absent from the works ? what if he/she overloaded with certain over job? How you tackled these factors ?

6 Please include both “study variables” and “operational definitions of terms “ as different sub titles

7 Ethical approval: Personally, I think the study conducted in Ethiopia and your target (study)populations are Ethiopian . But you have mentioned that you have obtained “Ethics approval from the University of New England Human Research Ethics Committee 133 (HREC) with an approval number: HE22-173” ….needs a further elaboration as you had to have an approval also from National ethics review Board of Ethiopia

Results

1 Please have a “Sub title “which clearly enhance the quality of your manuscript.

2 You have to report with Adjusted Odd Ratio

3 The results section needs tightening. For the descriptive section, either you report results as percentages or proportions (e.g., n/N). The way you have it now is confusing

Discussion

1 Generally, the discussion lacks depth, as it only compares the results across studies. When comparing the study findings with reports from the existing literature, it is recommended to comment on the reasons for the observed discrepancy based on the theoretical framework or give a plausible explanation. It is also required to indicate its clinical and theoretical implications on the topic of interest.

2 Further elaboration on statistical assumptions and policy implications would enhance transparency.

Strengths and Limitations of Study

1. Limitations should address potential biases (e.g., selection or recall bias), constraints in data collection (e.g., self-reporting or incomplete data), and generalizability of the findings to other populations or settings.

Conclusions and other section

1. The conclusion should be based only on the current study findings, according to your study objective. Don’t put general ideas and common sense here. All the recommendations should align with your study findings.

2. Finally, don’t forget attaching the most important section at end of your manuscript such as Data Sharing Statement, Ethical Approval, Acknowledgments, Authors’ Contributions, Funding Statement and Disclosure

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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

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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

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3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #2: 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: No

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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

**********

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: However, further elaboration on statistical assumptions and policy implications would enhance transparency. Data availability should be confirmed to ensure compliance with PLOS policies. Overall, the study is suitable for publication with minor refinements.

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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: Yes:  Anees Alyafei

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[NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.]

While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/ . PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org . Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step.

PONE-D-24-01799R3Food safety practices of individuals before and after the emergence of COVID-19: a pre- and post-comparative analysisPLOS ONE

Dear Dr.Teshome Gebeyehu ,

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.

Please submit your revised manuscript by Apr 26 2025 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.

Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:

• A rebuttal letter that responds to each point raised by the academic editor and reviewer(s). You should upload this letter as a separate file labeled 'Response to Reviewers'.
• A marked-up copy of your manuscript that highlights changes made to the original version. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Revised Manuscript with Track Changes'.
• An unmarked version of your revised paper without tracked changes. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Manuscript'.

If you would like to make changes to your financial disclosure, please include your updated statement in your cover letter. Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter.

If applicable, we recommend that you deposit your laboratory protocols in protocols.io to enhance the reproducibility of your results. Protocols.io assigns your protocol its own identifier (DOI) so that it can be cited independently in the future. For instructions see: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/submission-guidelines#loc-laboratory-protocols . Additionally, PLOS ONE offers an option for publishing peer-reviewed Lab Protocol articles, which describe protocols hosted on protocols.io. Read more information on sharing protocols at https://plos.org/protocols?utm_medium=editorial-email&utm_source=authorletters&utm_campaign=protocols .

We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

Adera Debella Kebede, MSC

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Journal Requirements:

Please review your reference list to ensure that it is complete and correct. If you have cited papers that have been retracted, please include the rationale for doing so in the manuscript text, or remove these references and replace them with relevant current references. Any changes to the reference list should be mentioned in the rebuttal letter that accompanies your revised manuscript. If you need to cite a retracted article, indicate the article’s retracted status in the References list and also include a citation and full reference for the retraction notice.

Additional Editor Comments:

Title: Food safety practices of individuals before and after the emergence of COVID-19: a pre- and post-comparative analysis

Thank you for addressing the major issues, here are also some points needs to consider and incorporated before deciding on the publication of your paper

Methods :

1. Inconsistency with your study period (line 20: 16 April 2023, and 31 June 2023; line 122: 6 April 2023 to 30 June 2023) please check it

2. Line 27 “The data was entered IBM SPSS version 28 and analyzed using ordinal logistic regression” ….how that ? if you entered the data using SPSS, how you control logical skipping and others . Why don’t you used EPI data software for data entry ? and moreover, once you amended the stated statement, move it to methods section of abstract .

MATERIALS AND METHODS:

1 Explicitly, you have employed STROBE Statement—Checklist of items as per comments but some of the points needs to be addressed in the details and you need to have a subtitle such for instance “Bias”…. Like recall bias, social desirability bias and how you mitigate it

2 Line 147-158: what you mentioned under the subtitle of “ study variables” need to moved to section of “operational definition “. Rather here you are expected your dependent (outcome variables) and independent variables

3 Line 160-188:Please re write section as “operational definitions of terms and measurement” . First define the listed term such as cleaning, separating and cooking, chilling etc. …. Then tell us how you measure it

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[NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.]

While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/ . PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org . Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step.

Food safety practices of individuals before and after the emergence of COVID-19: a pre- and post-comparative analysis

PONE-D-24-01799R4

Dear Dr.Teshome Gebeyehu,

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 will be generated when your article is formally accepted. Please note, if your institution has a publishing partnership with PLOS and your article meets the relevant criteria, all or part of your publication costs will be covered. Please make sure your user information is up-to-date by logging into Editorial Manager at Editorial Manager®  and clicking the ‘Update My Information' link at the top of the page. If you have any questions relating to publication charges, 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,

Adera Debella Kebede, MSC

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Additional Editor Comments (optional):

Reviewers' comments: