An Assessment of the Level of Compliance to Guidelines for Prevention of Covid-19 in Public Places in Iganga district, Uganda

Abstract

The global ongoing COVID-19 pandemic remains a major public health crisis of our time. In an effort to mitigate the outbreak of the deadly COVID-19 pandemic, WHO rolled out the COVID-19 SOPs to ensure the virus is controlled. The effectiveness of these COVID-19 SOPs mitigation measures is highly dependent on cooperation and compliance of all members of society [1]. Globally, a study which was conducted in the United Kingdom, found out that most but not all citizens had complied with COVID-19 SOPs guidelines; the Majority (80%) of UK citizens reported avoiding public places and 77% indicated that they improved their personal hygiene e.g., washing hands [2]. In the Sub-Saharan Africa, a study conducted in Nigeria by (Nnama-Okechukwu CU, 2020) findings indicated that a majority of the respondents believed that COVID-19 pandemic is more of a hoax than reality, of which poor knowledge negatively affected their compliance with preventive measures to curb the spread of COVID-19 [3]. This isn’t any different in the context of East Africa as reported by COVID-19 Pandemic Rapid Evidence Synthesis Group (COVPRES), hence suggested that poor knowledge negatively affect the level of compliance to COVID-19 SOPs.