Abstract
The whole world struggles to combat COVID-19 pandemic forcing nations to take extreme measures in an attempt to prevent outbreaks and save lives. It has been noted that COVID-19 has established itself as a risk factor for psychological distress among the population of different subgroups. There are several factors such as uncertainties, controversies, misinformation, social isolation, stigma, and discrimination which are escalating the risk of massive mental distress among the public. Nepal is trying to increase its effort to combat COVID-19 by adopting community containment measures, but the mental health of the frontline health workforce, service providers, and the general public seems to be highly overshadowed. In this aspect, this paper aims to shed light on different aspects of mental health issues emerging in Nepal during the time of COVID-19 lockdown, along with some of its potential contributing factors. Nepal lacks adequate infrastructure and human resource to provide mental healthcare services effectively in case of any massive mental distress. In this state of resource deprivation, providing education and training regarding psychosocial issues to health system leaders, first responders, and health care professionals could be a key to address the population need at present and to prevent further complications.
Highlights
The 2019 coronavirus disease (COVID-19), which emerged as an unknown outbreak of pneumonia in Wuhan on December 2, 2019 spread rapidly throughout the world forcing it to be recorded as a global pandemic on March 11, 2020 after infecting 118,319 global citizens and claiming 4,292 deaths.[1,2,3]
On 18 May 2020, Nepal Health Research Council (NHRC) published the list of nineteen COVID-19 related research proposals that were approved by the ethical review board of which eleven studies were concerned with the mental health among different population subgroups. 13
An online survey performed among 4872 participants from 31 provinces of China during the first week of February 2020 found that almost half, i.e. 48.3 % of the participants had experienced depression and 22.6% (95%CI: 21.4%-23.8%) of the participants had a certain level of anxiety, which were positively associated with frequent exposure to social media during the COVID-19.15 A nationwide survey of China found that almost one-third of the general public have experienced certain psychological distress due to COVID-19. 16
Summary
Mental Health Concern during COVID-19 Pandemic in Nepal. Europasian J Med Sci.2020;2(Covid-19 Special Issue): 77-82. The Europasian Journal of Medical Sciences (EJMS) (www.europasianjournals.org) is an official Journal of Nirvana Psychosocial Care Center & Ressearch Institute (www.nirvanapscc.com). The Journal as well as publisher remain neutral with regards to any jurisdictional claims in any published articles, its contents and the institutional affiliations of the authors.
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