Abstract
The increasing number cases of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) infections in the general population in Indonesia raises questions concerning the public’s knowledge and attitudes regarding this pandemic. To determine the correlation between the general public’s knowledge and attitudes regarding the COVID-19 outbreak 1 month after the first cases were reported in Indonesia. This cross-sectional study was conducted between early March and the end of April 2020 in the general population of Indonesia, beginning with the North Sumatra region, where the spread of COVID-19 in Indonesia began. Questionnaires were randomly distributed online in the red zone in Indonesia. Data were collected by collecting people’s responses to the questionnaire, which were distributed via WhatsApp (WA) application and were competed independently by the participants. A descriptive analysis was conducted to describe the demographic characteristics, knowledge, and attitudes of the general population. A total of 201 people had good knowledge (98%) and a positive attitude (96%) regarding the COVID-19 pandemic. The respondents had a negative attitude in relation to two aspects of the COVID-19 outbreak: having to always maintain a distance of 1.5 m when in crowds, and not being able to regularly exercise or eat nutritious food (78.6% and 79.1%, respectively). Most people in Indonesia have good knowledge and a positive attitude regarding the COVID-19 pandemic. However, negative attitudes were still found in this study, and as a result, transmission prevention measures cannot reach their maximum effectiveness by simply publicizing the increase in day-to-day cases to the general public.
Highlights
At present, the world is facing a pandemic due to an increase in coronavirus disease (COVID-19) infections
This was cross-sectional study that was conducted from early March to the end of April 2020 by randomly distributing questionnaires in areas infected with the COVID-19 virus in Indonesia
COVID-19 was shown, with a significance value of 0.04 (p < 0.05). These results indicated that good knowledge was correlated with a positive attitude, with a correlation value of 0.148, which indicated that the correlation was very weak
Summary
The world is facing a pandemic due to an increase in coronavirus disease (COVID-19) infections. Indonesia is among the countries that have experienced attacks. China reported the occurrence of this new disease on 31 December, 2019, with the first case being discovered on 1 December, 2019. At the end of 2019, the office of the World. Health Organization (WHO) in China received news that an unknown type of pneumonia was causing the disease. An acute respiratory infection that attacks the lungs was detected in Wuhan, Hubei, China [1,2,3]. The first casualty due to COVID-19 occurred on 11 January, 2020. China recorded a death in the population due to COVID-19, but approximately three weeks later, China reported the first person who was able to recover from
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