Psychological impact of the outbreak of COVID-19 on Holocaust survivors in France

Abstract

Identified in late 2019 as originating from Wuhan, China, coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak has spread rapidly and globally. The health crisis that is linked to COVID-19 has been declared a public health emergency of international concern (Zhong et al., 2020) and was described by UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterres, as being the worst world crisis since Second world war. In France, first cases of COVID-19 were officially confirmed on January 24, 2020 (Bernard Stoecklin, Rolland, & Silue, 2020). In a televised address on March 16, 2020, French President Emmanuel Macron declared six times during a speech to nation that “we are at war” against virus. He used following warrior rhetoric: “We fight neither against an army or against another nation, but enemy is there, invisible, elusive and advancing” (Kauffmann, 2020). The overuse of war metaphor when speaking about coronavirus, as well as measures of advising social distancing and self-isolation to decrease spread of coronavirus, are causing unknown levels of fear and suffering for older people who are more vulnerable to stress and anxiety (Yang et al., 2020, Johal, 2009). In contexts such as COVID-19 health crisis, Holocaust survivors (HSs) are often more vulnerable to accumulative and/or new traumatic events, which may awaken or augment reactions to a previously experienced traumatic event (Kimron & Cohen, 2012, Baider, Peretz, & Kaplan De-Nour, 1993, Christenson, Walker, Ross, & Maltbie, 1981, Yehuda et al., 1995). Several studies have reported considerable emotional distress that was experienced among HSs during Gulf War scud missile attacks in 1991 (Solomon & Prager, 1992), during threat of terror in Israel (Zloof, Yaphe, Durst, Venuta, & Fusman, 2005) or after terrorist attacks on World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, in USA (Lamet & Dyer, 2004). For some HSs, home confinement and helplessness that are being experienced during COVID-19 health crisis have resulted in re-experiencing of wartime traumas that occurred more than 76 years ago. Few studies have examined negative psychological impact of COVID-19 in HSs (Cohn-Schwartz et al., 2020; Shrira, Maytles, & Frenkel-Yosef, 2020, Maytles, Frenkel-Yosef, & Shrira, 2021) and offspring of HSs (Shrira & Felsen, 2021, Felsen,2021) in Israel and in US. France has fourth largest number of Holocaust survivors in world (approximately 40,000 survivors are located in France), according to estimates from Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany (Claims Conference). The COVID-19 health crisis provides a rare opportunity to examine how HSs in France may react to a second traumatic event that exhibits some similarities with original trauma, especially in regard to situation of lockdown combined with fear of death for either HS or for members of their family.