AJGH Nexus - Volume 17 2023

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Volume 17 | 2023 3.4. Specific worries of different demographics Table 2 summarises questions that showed a significant difference in level of worry between groups. The presence or absence of a chronic mental health condition was the variable most associated with higher levels with worry. People working in healthcare had a higher overall level of worry about the health system being overwhelmed compared with people working in other industries (p=0.005) but were less worried about economic recession than people working in other industries (p=0.006). People who responded that their work had been impacted by COVID-19 demonstrated higher level of worry about losing a loved one (p=0.042), economic recession (p=0.002), restricted access to food (p=0.043), becoming unemployed (p
Volume 17 | 2023 4.2 Comparison to other studies The pattern of responses to the worry scale questionnaire shared similarities with studies conducted in Ethiopia and Norway as well as longitudinal research being conducted in Australia,[11,15, 25] using a similar questionnaire (Table 4). The Australian SCRUB (Survey of COVID-19 Responses to Understand Behaviour) study has been tracking behaviour and concerns about COVID-19 in the Australian population through repeated cross-sectional and longitudinal sampling.[25] During the same time period as our study, the top four most worrisome questions from the SCRUB data all related to the economic and personal financial situation at the time. Differences in findings between the SCRUB study and our findings may be due to differences in recruitment approaches, timing of survey and sample demographics. 4.3 Implications of our results These results suggest that worry about the COVID-19 pandemic is complex and different worries interact with each other. Understanding the pattern of worry could be utilised to inform public health interventions to slow transmission. An approach that is informed by this pattern may reduce harmful and distressing levels of worry by empowering people to become active participants in preventing what worries them. Examples of how public health messages could be framed to respond to common worries highlighted in our results could be, “Wash your hands to protect your loved ones from coronavirus” or “Wear a mask when out and about to get back to supporting local businesses”. Additional, potentially pro-active support could also be offered to people living with pre-existing psychological distress/diagnosed mental health concerns. 4.4 Limitations Compared to other threats and disasters, relatively little is known about concerns in a pandemic.[26] The urgency of the COVID-19 situation confers limitations to research into behaviour and peoples’ perceptions of the response and validation studies for the items on our survey are yet to be undertaken.[6] There were several biases introduced in this study mainly through the inclusion criteria of engaging in paid or voluntary work. This decreased the likelihood of selecting financial concerns as one of their main worries. Additionally, bias was also introduced through distributing the survey via email to pre-existing contacts, as it was predominantly females who worked in healthcare with tertiary level education who completed the survey. Furthermore, certain demographic aspects of the respondents to the survey means these results cannot be easily generalised to the wider population. The survey was distributed Australia-wide, but most respondents were female (80.4%) and lived in non-metropolitan areas (78.1%). The latter was not controlled for in our analysis and may have had an influence on the level of worry with the vast majority of COVID-19 cases in Australia occurring in metropolitan areas.[12] Further, the total percentage of respondents living with a chronic physical health condition was relatively low (21.1%) in comparison to the Australian population, with the Department of Health estimating 50% of Australians have at least one chronic health condition.[27] 5. Conclusion This research contributes to an understanding of the patterns of pandemic-related worry. Personal and community health impacts of the virus and the consequences for the economy and the health system were consistently associated with a higher level of worry than other questions on the survey. Understanding this pattern has the potential to help inform the way public health messages should be communicated to maximise their health promoting benefits. Acknowledgements We would like to thank all the participants who kindly contributed to this study. Conflicts of Interest There are no conflicts of interest to declare. 06
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AJGH Nexus - Volume 17 2023

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