Public Response, Anxiety and Behaviour during the First Wave of COVID-19 Pandemic in Saudi Arabia.

Ada Mohammed Alqunaibet,Meshael Mohammed Alrasheed,Amani Salem Alqahtani

doi:10.3390/ijerph18094628

Abstract

This study aims to investigate public response attitude, anxiety, practices and trust in the authorities’ mitigation plan during the first wave of COVID-19 pandemic. A national cross sectional phone survey was conducted among Saudi residents aged 16 years and above. A total of 90,421 (45.2%) individuals participated in the study. Of those, the overall rate of COVID-19 correct knowledge was 82% (mean: 9.84); social media was the most reported source of knowledge. Younger age, low levels of education and foreign residents were associated with poor knowledge. Overall, 49.5% scored 5 or more on the GAD-7 test, indicating anxiety symptoms, 19.2% of them scored 10 and above, suggesting moderate to severe anxiety. Majority of participants (>78%) trusted and supported the interventions implemented by the government to control COVID-19. Social distancing practices among participants was as following, 72.5% stayed at home and avoid going out for nonessential business and 49.5% avoided attending social events and family gatherings. Trust in authorities, being anxious, worry and levels of knowledge about the disease, were the most common factors affecting adoption of the recommended practices. Continuous evaluation of public response about COVID-19, and the effectiveness of protective measures is essential to better inform policy-makers and identify ways of encouraging behaviour change among public during pandemic.

Highlights

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is an emerging respiratory infection caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) [1]
Individuals with low levels of education, and foreign residents were associated with poor knowledge of the disease
This knowledge is influenced by demographic factors of the participants; younger age groups, individuals with low levels of education and foreign residents were associated with poor knowledge of the disease

Summary

Introduction

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is an emerging respiratory infection caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) [1]. Saudi Arabia has adopted various national response strategies aiming to control the pandemic curve, starting with travel suspension, shutdown of schools, limiting workspace access and curfew (Figure 1). An additional implemented containment strategy is focussing on tracing, treating and isolating infected peoples as well as educating the public about personal protective measures, including hand hygiene, cough etiquette and social distancing to reduce the risk of transmission [4]. Studies have found that the wide coverage of personal protective measures among the population helped delay an influenza pandemic and decreased the infection rate, possibly reducing transmission and sufficiently containing the pandemic [5,6,7]. Encouraging the public to adhere to protective measures could be challenging. The adoption of these measures is affected mostly by individuals’. Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations

Objectives

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion