Knowledge, Attitude and Practice Towards Covid-19 among Community Pharmacists in Tripoli - Libya

Abstract

This research aims in measuring the level of knowledge, attitude, and practice towards COVID-19 on community pharmacists in Tripoli, Libya. A cross-sectional survey was performed utilising an online questionnaire from the 1st to 27th March 2021. Data were gathered from a random sample of 260 community pharmacists (CPs) in Tripoli. Of the 260 participants, most respondents (71.66%, n = 187) had a good knowledge level about COVID-19. Moreover, approximately (88.23% n = 229) of the participants had positive attitudes. Most of the participants (84.35%, n = 219) had good practice levels against COVID-19. Educational level was associated with knowledge attitudes and pharmacist practices (p <0.05). No association was found between employment type with attitudes and pharmacist practices, while the experience was not associated with attitudes. There was a difference in the degrees of knowledge of community pharmacists in marital status, age, experience, level of education in relation to COVID-19. The only difference occurs in the CPs attitude scores for education level. Moreover, employment, level of education, marital status, and experience were all associated with levels of practice. The results indicated the existence of differences in the scores of CPs’ practices with respect to marital status, experience and qualifications. Regarding COVID-19, good knowledge was observed to be a better indicator of positive attitude (OR: 2.0993, p=0.001) and good practice (OR:1. 828, p=0.049) The requirements for applying the KAP of COVID-19 among CPs are acceptable and require more attention.