Fear of coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19), a pandemic too

Anusha N, Satyanarayana D, Archana V

Pdf Page Numbers :- 192-198

Anusha N^1,*, Satyanarayana D¹, and Archana V²

¹Department of Psychiatry, Gayatri Vidya Parishad Institute of Health Care and Medical Technology, Madhurawada, Visakhapatnam-530048, Andhra Pradesh, India

²Department of Psychiatry, GITAM Institute of Medical sciences and Research Visakhapatnam-530045, Andhra Pradesh, India

*Corresponding author: Dr. N. Anusha, Department of Psychiatry, Gayatri Vidya Parishad Institute of Health Care and Medical Technology, Madhurawada, Visakhapatnam-530048, Andhra Pradesh, India. Mobile: +91 9573688989; Email: anuhanemani@gmail.com

Received 15 July 2021; Revised 24 August 2021; Accepted 30 August 2021; Published 6 September 2021

Citation: Anusha N, Satyanarayana D, Archana V. Fear of coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19), a pandemic too. J Med Sci Res. 2021; 9(4):192-198. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.17727/JMSR.2021/9-29

Copyright: © 2021 Anusha N et al. Published by KIMS Foundation and Research Center. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

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Abstract

Current management of coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) focusses on infection control, development of a vaccine and the treatment of patients with little emphasis on psychosocial aspects. This study aimed at studying the prevalence and variables associated with fear of COVID-19 on Indian population. A cross sectional study was conducted on 1002 participants via an online survey and the data was analysed by SPSS version 26. The mean age of population was 32.29 with a SD of 14.17. Of the total population, 54.1 % were males and 45.9% were females. 15% of the population had anxiety and depression and 15% had fear of death across ages and literacy levels. Subjects with low education, lower income, staying away from the family and being tested for COVID-19, had higher levels of fear. Higher levels of fear were amongst news watchers and COVID-19 message forwarders. Amongst the infected or the contact population there was a lot of fear reaction to the disease. This study highlighted the fear spread among various groups of the population and a need for better pandemic preparedness.

Keywords: COVID-19; anxiety; mental health; pandemic preparedness; coronavirus