Dataset Information

Home Alone: Implications of COVID-19 for Mental Health.

ABSTRACT:

Rationale

The outbreak of the 2019 novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) has induced a considerable degree of fear, emotional stress and anxiety among individuals around the world.

Objective

The objective of this study is to evaluate the relationship between COVID-19 virus cases per 1000 residents and mental health outcomes of individuals across the globe.

Methods

Using plausibly exogenous variation in daily country-level reports of new COVID-19 cases across the world, this study employs an individual-by-day global data set to assess the association between virus outbreak intensity and short-term measures of mental health outcomes.

Results

Results indicate that females are 20.02% (95 % CI [6.65 %, 33.39 %]) more likely than males to find life depressing, suggesting that they may bear a much larger mental health burden than males during the COVID-19 pandemic. The association between the pandemic and mental health is more pronounced among individuals staying at home for the past week, who are 14.81 % (95 % CI [3.46 %, 26.16 %]) more likely to feel anxious and 11.17 % (95 % CI [2.13 %, 20.21 %]) more likely to experience emotional instability than their counterparts. The association between virus outbreak intensity and the likelihood of anxiety among individuals staying at home increases with household size, ranging from 11.73 % (95 % CI [-4.65 %, 28.11 %]) among individuals with 0-1 members in the household to 21.02 % (95 % CI [5.73 %, 36.31 %]) among those with 4-8 members in the household.

Conclusion

These short-run estimates of mental health damages associated with COVID-19 imply that welfare losses from pandemics among individuals are enormous across the globe.

SUBMITTER: Paudel J

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8479491 | biostudies-literature |

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Project description:BackgroundThe coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has posed a significant influence on public mental health. Current efforts focus on alleviating the impacts of the disease on public health and the economy, with the psychological effects due to COVID-19 relatively ignored. In this research, we are interested in exploring the quantitative characterization of the pandemic impact on public mental health by studying an online survey dataset of the United States.MethodsThe analyses are conducted based on a large scale of online mental health-related survey study in the United States, conducted over 12 consecutive weeks from April 23, 2020 to July 21, 2020. We are interested in examining the risk factors that have a significant impact on mental health as well as in their estimated effects over time. We employ the multiple imputation by chained equations (MICE) method to deal with missing values and take logistic regression with the least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (Lasso) method to identify risk factors for mental health.ResultsOur analysis shows that risk predictors for an individual to experience mental health issues include the pandemic situation of the State where the individual resides, age, gender, race, marital status, health conditions, the number of household members, employment status, the level of confidence of the future food affordability, availability of health insurance, mortgage status, and the information of kids enrolling in school. The effects of most of the predictors seem to change over time though the degree varies for different risk factors. The effects of risk factors, such as States and gender show noticeable change over time, whereas the factor age exhibits seemingly unchanged effects over time.ConclusionsThe analysis results unveil evidence-based findings to identify the groups who are psychologically vulnerable to the COVID-19 pandemic. This study provides helpful evidence for assisting healthcare providers and policymakers to take steps for mitigating the pandemic effects on public mental health, especially in boosting public health care, improving public confidence in future food conditions, and creating more job opportunities.Trial registrationThis article does not report the results of a health care intervention on human participants.

Project description:BACKGROUND:The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) has led to dramatic changes worldwide in people's everyday lives. To combat the pandemic, many governments have implemented social distancing, quarantine, and stay-at-home orders. There is limited research on the impact of such extreme measures on mental health. OBJECTIVE:The goal of this study was to examine whether stay-at-home orders produced differential changes in mental health symptoms using internet search queries on a national scale. METHODS:In the United States, individual states vary in their adoption of measures to reduce the spread of COVID-19; as of March 23, 2020, 11 of the 50 states had issued stay-at-home orders. The staggered rollout of stay-at-home measures across the United States allows us to investigate whether these measures impact mental health by exploring variations in mental health search queries across the states. This paper examines the changes in mental health search queries on Google between March 16-23, 2020, across each state and Washington, DC. Specifically, this paper examines differential changes in mental health searches based on patterns of search activity following issuance of stay-at-home orders in these states compared to all other states. The participants were all the people who searched mental health terms in Google between March 16-23. Between March 16-23, 11 states underwent stay-at-home orders to prevent the transmission of COVID-19. Outcomes included search terms measuring anxiety, depression, obsessive-compulsive, negative thoughts, irritability, fatigue, anhedonia, concentration, insomnia, and suicidal ideation. RESULTS:Analyzing over 10 million search queries using generalized additive mixed models, the results suggested that the implementation of stay-at-home orders are associated with a significant flattening of the curve for searches for suicidal ideation, anxiety, negative thoughts, and sleep disturbances, with the most prominent flattening associated with suicidal ideation and anxiety. CONCLUSIONS:These results suggest that, despite decreased social contact, mental health search queries increased rapidly prior to the issuance of stay-at-home orders, and these changes dissipated following the announcement and enactment of these orders. Although more research is needed to examine sustained effects, these results suggest mental health symptoms were associated with an immediate leveling off following the issuance of stay-at-home orders.