COVID-19 Pandemic In Pakistan Research Articles

Zakat, Non-state Welfare Provision and Redistribution in Times of Crisis: Evidence from the Covid-19 Pandemic

AbstractAround the world, the Covid-19 pandemic drew attention to state social protection and its limitations. Less attention has been paid to what is likely the world’s largest system of predominantly non-state welfare provision: zakat, an annual Islamic obligatory payment of a percentage of productive wealth to the poor and other eligible recipients. We explore how states and citizens engage with zakat during crises through a case study of the Covid-19 pandemic in Pakistan, Egypt, and Morocco, drawing on novel and nationally representative survey data of 5484 respondents across the three countries. While we may expect that citizens may be less motivated to pay zakat in times of personal economic hardship, we find that a large majority of the general population and of zakat contributors perceives zakat as particularly important in the Covid context. We show that while zakat may play an important role in non-state social welfare provision supplementing state social protection and redistribution in times of crisis, state attempts to harness it are often ineffective. However, while we find that higher income individuals are more likely to pay zakat, even only among those that are eligible, there are potentially negative equity impacts given the flat rate at which it is levied and the fact that people tend to give through personal networks.

“We are in a very precarious position”: Exploring the resilience of Khawaja Sara and Hijra communities during the COVID-19 pandemic in Pakistan

This paper draws upon empirical data in order to offer insights to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the lives of Khawaja Sara and Hijra communities in Peshawar City, in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa region of Pakistan. The paper also considers the resilience that the community developed during this time. Drawing on Butler’s concept of precarity and liveability, we in this article demonstrate how the precarious positionalities of Khawaja Sara and Hijra were exacerbated during the COVID-19 pandemic and thereafter in Pakistan. 10 members of Khawaja Sara and Hijra communities were engaged in face-to-face interviews, and the paper demonstrates how community is made and maintained by Khawaja Sara and Hijra, who are amongst the most vulnerable, marginalized, oppressed, and isolated people in South Asian communities. Whilst not shying away from the violence that characterises the lives of participants, who face familial rejection, community, and social pressure to conform to strict cultural gender norms, and sexual and physical violence, the paper also works to highlight the ongoing adaptability and resilience of these ancient communities through engaging with the ways in which participants supported each other through the pandemic.

Thriving in Turmoil: Unraveling the Interplay of Resources, Resilience, and Performance among SMEs in Times of Economic Vulnerability

This research endeavours to contribute to the existing body of scholarly work by elucidating the pivotal role of social networks in bolstering the resilience of Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs) amid the propagation of COVID-19. Despite the considerable research on the interplay between networks and firms' performance, extant literature still needs to comprehensively elucidate how social networks influence organizational performance, particularly within the context of the personal dis-contact phase observed in Pakistan. Moreover, the crucial nexus between resilience, social networks, and firm performance still needs to be adequately explored. Consequently, this paper seeks to address these gaps by introducing a novel conceptual framework termed the Resource-Resilience-Performance framework. This framework aims to delineate the intricate mechanisms through which social networks, as a valuable resource, facilitate the adaptive capabilities of SMEs, thereby fostering resilience and ultimately enhancing sustainability amidst crises. Employing a deductive approach, this study adopts a survey strategy to gather data from 410 SME owner-managers, focusing on the third phase of the COVID-19 pandemic in Pakistan. Data collection is executed through an adaptive questionnaire. Subsequently, an analysis is conducted using SmartPLS with the Bootstrapping approach. The findings reveal that formal and informal social ties are crucial in providing SME owners with valuable information from their social networks. These networks serve as a support mechanism, aiding managers in making informed decisions amidst adversities and granting them a competitive edge over their counterparts. Given the unavailability of a comprehensive and up-to-date list of SMEs in Pakistan during the pandemic, the snowball sampling technique was utilized. Consequently, the generalizability of the findings may be questioned. However, there remains potential to establish a directory of SMEs and employ probability sampling techniques in future studies. This research contributes to social network theory by enriching our understanding of its application during the pandemic. Furthermore, it empirically demonstrates the instrumental role of social networks in providing support during crises, offering guidance to managers on cultivating robust social ties as a proactive strategy for navigating future uncertainties. Ultimately, this study underscores the significance of social capital as an immunizing factor for SMEs operating in developing countries, particularly within the context of Pakistan.

Crisis risk communication and public behavior: Analysis of the COVID-19 pandemic in Pakistan

This study underpins the crisis risk communication (CRC) theory, investigating the integral role of social media in Pakistan towards COVID-19, its influence on cognitive priming processes, and behavior regulation. Empirical findings reveal predominantly positive public sentiment toward preventive behaviors, with mask-wearing and sanitizer use widely embraced. However, the inclination to avoid gatherings with risk groups is comparatively lower. This collective adherence to preventive measures suggests a shared effort to curb COVID-19, influenced by factors like the perceived helpfulness of social media. The populace exhibits a predominantly favorable attitude towards COVID-19 vaccination, signifying widespread acceptance of vaccines within the country. Additionally, the study assesses public satisfaction with the government’s pandemic management, revealing an overall positive sentiment. Nonetheless, concerns emerge regarding essential needs, including food, shelter, and treatment. Enhancing our insight, this study sheds light on the intricate interplay between CRC, social media, and public behavior amidst a health crisis. The insights gleaned from this study provide valuable guidance for policymakers and public health practitioners to refine future communication strategies and address societal concerns effectively during pandemics.

Trends in typhoid fever during the COVID-19 pandemic in Pakistan.

Pakistan has been experiencing an extensively drug-resistant (XDR) outbreak of typhoid for some years. We sought to evaluate how the COVID-19 pandemic impacted typhoid epidemiology in Pakistan, from the beginning of the pandemic in 2020 through the end of 2022, and the reduction of COVID-19 cases. We compared national public COVID-19 data with retrospectively obtained patient data of confirmed S. Typhi isolates between January 2019 and December 2022 from Shaukat Khanum Memorial Cancer Hospital and Research Centre and the hospital's extended network of laboratory collection centers across Pakistan. We observed that during the early onset of the COVID-19 pandemic and COVID-19 peaks, typhoid positivity generally decreased. This suggests that restrictions and non-pharmaceutical interventions that limited social interactions and promoted good sanitation and hygiene practices had a positive secondary effect on typhoid. This led to an overall yearly decrease in typhoid positivity between 2019 to 2021. However, the percentage of S. Typhi cases isolated that were ceftriaxone-resistant continued to increase, suggesting the continued dominance of XDR typhoid in Pakistan. In 2022, with the alleviation of pandemic restrictions, we observed increased typhoid positivity and COVID-19 and typhoid positivity started to follow similar trends. Given the continued presence of COVID-19 along with XDR typhoid in Pakistan, it will be imperative to use differential testing to ensure that the epidemiology of each reported is accurate, the spread of each it contained, and that antibiotics are not misused. The use of approved vaccinations will lessen the burden of both diseases.

Government Policies in Combating COVID-19 Pandemic in Pakistan: A Gender-based Perspective

Government Policies in Combating COVID-19 Pandemic in Pakistan: A Gender-based Perspective

The Nexus of Covid-19 and Behavioral Intentions of University Students Towards Online Education

The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic has significantly disrupted the traditional pedagogical educational system worldwide. The story of Pakistan is also not different from that of the rest of the world. Pakistan’s higher education institutes were closed for classes due to the outbreak. Some universities started the virtual education system, and it is critically important to assess the behavioral intentions of university students toward online education during the COVID-19 pandemic in Pakistan. This is the first study investigating students' responses to online education during the COVID-19 pandemic. For this purpose, an online survey was conducted to obtain the students' responses from the higher institutions providing online classes during COVID-19. The results were evaluated using multivariate analysis and descriptive statistics. It was observed that there is a significant difference between male and female students concerning the positive consequences of COVID-19 on students. According to the findings, the students' intentions for online education are more concerned with saving time to complete the degree program. Higher education institutions should also provide online educational opportunities to students besides traditional physical modes. Online educational interventions will be helpful for students during unavoidable circumstances like political instabilities, natural disasters, viral disease outbreaks, etc. to complete degrees and diplomas. Doi: 10.28991/ESJ-2024-SIED1-02 Full Text: PDF

Comparative study of TVCs treatment before and during covid-19 pandemic in Pakistan

The worldwide health economy has been decimated by Covid-19 pandemic. Advertisers take advantage of the public's anxiety and emotions as a result of the pandemic. In this research, the content of various products’ advertisements shown on television, before and during Covid-19 pandemic were compared. These ads have not been compared empirically in terms of their running period before this. Content and techniques of advertisements also changes according to the developing situations. Therefore, this paper focused on the changes in the approach for advertising, their presentation and the level of deception in the ads. Data collection was done by purposive sampling. This research paper critically analyzed the TVCs treatment in both periods. Through comparative analysis of the selected sample, the research paper found that these companies made false claims, deceptive ads and mislead the consumers to promote their products by taking advantage of the ongoing pandemic situation in Pakistan.

COVID-19 pandemic impacted internet use and anxiety among general public during COVID-19 pandemic in Pakistan.

To determine the association between internet use and anxiety among people during the coronavirus disease- 2019 pandemic. The cross-sectional study was conducted across Pakistan from January 14 to February 21, 2021, which was the active phase of the coronavirus disease-2019 pandemic in Pakistan. The participants were aged at least 13 years having internet access regardless of gender or their location across Pakistan. The anonymous web-based survey was conducted using a questionnaire generated on Google Forms and disseminated through various social media platforms and WhatsApp groups. Anxiety symptoms were screened using the Depression, Anxiety and Stress Scale-21, while the Young Internet Addiction Test was used to evaluate symptoms of internet addiction. Data was analysed using STATA 16. Of the 1,145 subjects, 686(60%) were females and 459(40%) were males. A total of 257(22.5%) participants were found to have extremely severe anxiety and internet usage pattern was significantly associated with the level of anxiety (p<0.05). Age, gender, social class and marital status were not significantly different (p>0.05), while family income and area of living were significantly different (p<0.05) in terms of anxiety levels. The odd of addictive internet use was 10.2 (95% confidence interval: 5.7-18.5) times greater in extreme anxiety individuals compared to individuals having no anxiety after controlling for other sociodemographic, health-related, behavioural and environmental factors during the pandemic. A significant association of anxiety was found with internet addiction during the coronavirus disease-2019 pandemic.

Influence of gender identity on the adoption of religious-spiritual, preventive and emotion-focused coping strategies during the COVID-19 pandemic in Pakistan

Background Academic research has highlighted the gendered impacts and amplifications of gender disparities of COVID-19. Traditionally, Pakistan is a patriarchal society, where it is a parenthood norm to socialize specific gender social roles. Objectives The current research asserts that these normative gender roles may influence individuals throughout their life course, even during the COVID-19 pandemic. Therefore, the present study explored the influence of gender identity in adopting different coping strategies such as religious-spiritual, preventive, emotion-focused and non-constructive coping against the COVID-19 pandemic. Methods Due to the lockdown in various areas of Pakistan, data were collected through an online questionnaire using Qualtrics. In a cross-sectional study, 955 respondents completed responses. Factors analysis and reliability analysis were run to ensure the scales’ reliability, validity and robustness for different coping strategies. Multivariate linear regression analysis was used to find model fitness. Conclusions For theoretical explanation, the current study used social role theory that argues that each gender benefits differently from distinct coping behaviours. The findings highlighted that women were more likely to adopt most coping strategies, with the most significant difference in religious-spiritual coping and preventative coping strategies even in the presence of control variables such as level of education, household monthly income, family structure, marital status and family size. There was no gender difference in adopting non-constructive strategies. The empirical evidence suggested that females might be at an increased risk of stress due to the burden of unbalanced household-based social norms and care responsibilities. The current research also expanded the base of coping to religious-spiritual coping, emotion-focused coping and non-constructive coping.

Healthcare workers safety in the COVID-19 era: the impact of pre-pandemic personal protective equipment (PPE) training in Pakistan

BackgroundThe COVID-19 pandemic has revealed vulnerabilities in healthcare systems worldwide, emphasizing the importance of healthcare worker safety through adequate utilization of personal protective equipment (PPE). This study aims to assess the impact of pre-pandemic PPE training on the practices and other associated factors among frontline healthcare workers during the COVID-19 pandemic in Pakistan and provide insights into the implications of such training programs for future initiatives.MethodsA cross-sectional study from May 9th to June 5th, 2020 was conducted among the frontline healthcare workers against COVID-19 in Pakistan, utilizing an online structured questionnaire shared via WhatsApp and Facebook by using purposive sampling. Statistical analyses, including chi-square tests for proportion and logistic regression for the association while multi-logistic regression for potential confounders, were performed using SPSS version 22.ResultsA total of 453 healthcare staff participated, with 68.9% (n = 312) reporting no prior PPE training and 31.1% (n = 141) having received training. Significant associations were found between prior training and healthcare group distribution (p = 0.006), with doctors exhibiting the highest proportion of training 82 (37.61%), followed by nurses 50 (27.32%) and paramedics 9 (17.31%). Those who didn’t receive any prior training in PPEs showed a higher perceived professional risk of 216 (69.23%) compared to those who received prior PPE training 96 (30.77%, p-value 0.005). Similarly, a higher frequency 137 (63.72%) of Perceived Personal risk was observed in those who didn’t receive training, labeled as “high risk” compared to those who were trained 78 (36.28%, P value 0.02). Multi-logistic regression analysis identified paramedics as 0.26 times less likely to have received prior PPE training (Adjusted OR 0.26, 95% CI 0.10–0.65, p = 0.01) compared to medical doctors. Healthcare workers in tertiary care hospitals were 0.46 times less likely to undergo PPE training (Adjusted OR 0.46, 95% CI 0.25–0.87,p = 0.01) compared to those working at COVID-19 facilities/hospitals/quarantine centers. Likewise, individuals who doffed disposable gowns [Adjusted OR 3.86, (95% CI, 1.23–12.08, p = 0.02] were 3.86 times more interested in getting prior training in PPE compared to those who don’t have skills to wear them.ConclusionOur findings highlight that healthcare levels, type of healthcare, and doffing skills are important predictors of whether healthcare workers have taken prior training in PPE. These findings imply developing effective training programs for healthcare workers to ensure safety while providing care during pandemics like COVID-19.

Influence of Government Innovation Initiatives on Responsive E-governance: An Empirical Analsysis on Government Response to COVID-19 Pandemic in Pakistan

Numerous segments of society have been affected by the global Covid-19 pandemic. It has heralded a new era oriented toward the digitization of Pakistan after the shutdown of public sector institutions and disruptions in governance implementations. The objective of this study is to investigate how governments’ innovation initiatives enhance government response to cope with Covid-19 with the primitive mechanism of citizens’ adoption intention behavior during the pandemic. Employing a structural equation model in SmartPLS, data samples collected from 663 followers of social media accounts of government information department through a self-administered survey questionnaire were examined. The findings indicated a direct and indirect relationship between governments' innovation initiatives and responsive e-governance, intending to adopt e-services acting as a mediator. Similarly, the quality of government information was found to influence citizens' willingness to adopt e-services by interacting with innovation initiatives. Institutions and policymakers can benefit from the study's strategic and practical recommendations.

Unveiling Maternal Health Insights During the COVID-19 Pandemic in Pakistan: Using Causal Loop Diagrams to Illuminate and Prevent Unintended Policy Effects.

Unveiling Maternal Health Insights During the COVID-19 Pandemic in Pakistan: Using Causal Loop Diagrams to Illuminate and Prevent Unintended Policy Effects.

When healers get wounded! Moral injury in healthcare providers during the COVID-19 pandemic in Pakistan.

Moral injury (MI) is a multi-faceted and multidimensional phenomenon. Occupational MI has been studied mainly among military personnel and first responders and is linked to mental health problems. MI encompasses negative moral emotions such as shame, guilt, and anger leading to distress, and impairment in social and occupational functioning. The COVID-19 pandemic predisposed healthcare providers to moral dilemmas, potentially morally injurious events (PMIEs), and MI. We aimed to assess the prevalence and predictors of MI in healthcare providers during the COVID-19 pandemic in Pakistan. This cross-sectional study was conducted in July-October 2021 among physician/clinician staff working at teaching hospitals in Lahore. The Moral Injury Symptoms Scale-Health Professionals (MISS-HP) was used to collect data. SPSS 26 was used for data analysis applying Wilcoxon Mann-Whitney U and Kruskal-Wallis tests on non-normally distributed data at α = 0.05. Predictors of MI were ascertained through Binary Logistic Regression analysis. Four hundred and twenty physicians responded to the questionnaires. The Median (IQR) MI scores were 37(28-47). Guilt, moral concerns, and shame were higher-scoring MI dimensions. 40.8% (n = 171) suffered from clinically significant distress and impaired functioning while 14.3% (n = 60) from severe distress. Gender, department, and history of psychiatric illness predicted higher levels of distress which were 1.9 times higher in females than males and 2.5 times higher with a history of psychiatric illness. Working on the front lines did not predict MI. Our findings highlight the substantial burden of MI in our sample during COVID-19, having implications for healthcare providers' well-being, healthcare quality, and service delivery. This calls for concerted efforts from all stakeholders to better prepare for future disasters through effective human-resource policies, pre-trauma exposure soft-skills training, effective teamwork and communication strategies; self-stewardship and resilience modules, and mental health support for healthcare providers. The dimensional construct of MI may vary across cultures; hence we recommend further cross-cultural research on MI in healthcare providers, particularly in the context of public health disasters.

Moderating Role of Socio-Economic Status: Health Belief Model and Preventive Measures for COVID-19 Pandemic in Pakistan

Objective: The current study aimed at understanding the health belief model approach about the third wave of the COVID-19 pandemic in Pakistan and the assessment of preventive measures against this pandemic. Secondly, the study aimed to examine the role of socioeconomic status as a moderator between the health belief model and preventive measures.Study Design: Cross-sectional study.Place and Duration of Study: The study was cross-sectional and grounded on data gathered by google forms throughout Punjab province from March 2021 to May 2021.Materials and Methods: For assessment of the health belief model World Health Organization (WHO) Cosmo protocol was adopted, and the preventive strategies questionnaire was implemented through Google Forms. It analyzed how socioeconomic status moderates the influence of the health beliefs of the Pakistani population on preventive behavior during the COVID-19 pandemic. Socio-economic status was assessed through the Federal Bureau of Statistic (FBS) data with the addition of four other dimensions (total family members, monthly income, total earning members in the family, residence personal/rent).Results: Results revealed that constructs of the health belief model, Susceptibility (p&lt;.002), Severity (p&lt;.026), Self-efficacy (p&lt;.000), and Knowledge about the disease (p&lt;.006) revealed a statistically predictive relationship with the predictive measures taken by Pakistani population. Furthermore, moderating analysis exposed that although some constructs of the health belief model played a significant role in the use of predictive measures, but role of socioeconomic status as a moderator in their relationship was non-significant.Conclusion: The current study's findings revealed that although different health beliefs like susceptibility, severity, self-efficacy, and knowledge predict the taking of preventive measures, socio-economic status as moderating variable played a non-significant role on the relationship between health beliefs and preventive measures taken by Pakistani population.

Machine Learning-Based Hybrid Ensemble Model Achieving Precision Education for Online Education Amid the Lockdown Period of COVID-19 Pandemic in Pakistan

Institutions of higher learning have made persistent efforts to provide students with a high-quality education. Educational data mining (EDM) enables academic institutions to gain insight into student data in order to extract information for making predictions. COVID-19 represents the most catastrophic pandemic in human history. As a result of the global pandemic, all educational systems were shifted to online learning (OL). Due to issues with accessing the internet, disinterest, and a lack of available tools, online education has proven challenging for many students. Acquiring accurate education has emerged as a major goal for the future of this popular medium of education. Therefore, the focus of this research was to identifying attributes that could help in students’ performance prediction through a generalizable model achieving precision education in online education. The dataset used in this research was compiled from a survey taken primarily during the academic year of COVID-19, which was taken from the perspective of Pakistani university students. Five machine learning (ML) regressors were used in order to train the model, and its results were then analyzed. Comparatively, SVM has outperformed the other methods, yielding 87.5% accuracy, which was the highest of all the models tested. After that, an efficient hybrid ensemble model of machine learning was used to predict student performance using NB, KNN, SVM, decision tree, and logical regression during the COVID-19 period, yielding outclass results. Finally, the accuracy obtained through the hybrid ensemble model was obtained as 98.6%, which demonstrated that the hybrid ensemble learning model has performed better than any other model for predicting the performance of students.

A multimodal hybrid stochastic-based deterministic ARFIMA model for the sustainable analysis of COVID-19 pandemic

The revise abstract is given as follows: The rapid emergence of the super-spreader COVID-19 with severe economic calamities with devastating social impact worldwide created the demand for effective research on the spread dynamics of the disease to combat and create surveillance systems on a global scale. In this study, a novel hybrid Deterministic Autoregressive Fractional Integral Moving Average (ARFIMA) model is presented to forecast the bimodal COVID-19 transmission dynamics. The heterogeneity of multimodal behavior of the COVID-19 pandemic in Pakistan is modeled by a hybrid paradigm, in which a deterministic pattern is combined with the ARFIMA model to absorb the inherent chaotic pattern of the pandemic spread. The fractional fluctuation of the real epidemic system is effectively taken as a paradigm by stochastic type improved the deterministic model and ARFIMA process. Special transformations are also introduced to enhance the convergent rate of the bimodal paradigm in deterministic modeling. The outcome of the improved deterministic model is combined with the ARFIMA model is evaluated on the spread pattern of pandemic data in Pakistan for the next 30 days. The performance-indices of the hybrid-model based on Relative-Errors and RMSE statistics confirmed the effectiveness of the proposed paradigm for long-term epidemic modeling compared to other classical and machine learning algorithms.

Influence of Social Media on Consumers' Online Purchasing Habits During: The COVID-19 Pandemic in Pakistan

Currently, businesses located all over the world are adjusting to a new standard of operation. Customers are encouraged to make their purchases of necessities through the favored e-commerce platform of the organization. For the purpose of marketing web-based enterprises, websites such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest are utilized. The purpose of the study was to investigate how the COVID-19 epidemic altered the purchase patterns of Pakistani customers shopping online, with a particular emphasis on the role played by social media. The study utilized a quantitative research model and a descriptive research technique in its data collection and analysis. In order to obtain responses from 400 Pakistani clients, an online questionnaire employing the "purposive sampling" method was used. When looking at the data and putting the hypothesis to the test, PLS-SEM analysis was utilized. During the COVID-19 pandemic in Pakistan, a PLS-SEM study indicated that advertising tools, online reviews, and endorsements from celebrities had a favorable and significant effect on how individuals bought products online. According to the findings of this study, online businesses can improve their use of social media for marketing and advertising by following a number of particular measures. Customers have a greater propensity to make purchases via social media platforms when they come across favorable evaluations and recommendations from celebrities.

Potentially devastating monkeypox outbreak amidst COVID-19 pandemic in Pakistan.

Dow University of Health Sciences, Karachi, Pakistan Sponsorships or competing interests that may be relevant to content are disclosed at the end of this article. Published online ■ ■ *Corresponding author. Address: Dow University of Health Sciences, Karachi 75290, Pakistan. Tel.: +923342931486. E-mail address: [email protected] (K. Riaz). This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 License, which allows others to remix, tweak, and build upon the work non-commercially, as long as the author is credited and the new creations are licensed under the identical terms. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/

Knowledge, Attitude and Practices of Self-Medication Including Antibiotics among Health Care Professionals during the COVID-19 Pandemic in Pakistan: Findings and Implications.

Since the emergence of COVID-19, several different medicines including antimicrobials have been administered to patients to treat COVID-19. This is despite limited evidence of the effectiveness of many of these, fueled by misinformation. These utilization patterns have resulted in concerns for patients' safety and a rise in antimicrobial resistance (AMR). Healthcare workers (HCWs) were required to serve in high-risk areas throughout the pandemic. Consequently, they may be inclined towards self-medication. However, they have a responsibility to ensure any medicines recommended or prescribed for the management of patients with COVID-19 are evidence-based. However, this is not always the case. A descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted among HCWs in six districts of the Punjab to assess their knowledge, attitude and practices of self-medication during the ongoing pandemic. This included HCWs working a range of public sector hospitals in the Punjab Province. A total of 1173 HCWs were included in the final analysis. The majority of HCWs possessed good knowledge regarding self-medication and good attitudes. However, 60% were practicing self-medication amid the COVID-19 pandemic. The most frequent medicines consumed by the HCWs under self-medication were antipyretics (100%), antibiotics (80.4%) and vitamins (59.9%). Azithromycin was the most commonly purchase antibiotic (35.1%). In conclusion, HCWs possess good knowledge of, and attitude regarding, medicines they purchased. However, there are concerns that high rates of purchasing antibiotics, especially "Watch" antibiotics, for self-medication may enhance AMR. This needs addressing.