The Impacts of Covid-19 on Mental Health (Research Paper Sample)

Medicine in The News
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Medicine in The News: The Impacts of Covid-19 on Mental Health
Mental health is a condition when one can successfully perform regular activities showing positive results. Mental health state is also an individual's ability to adapt to transformations and cope with current challenges (ODPHP, 2020). Mental health is crucial to people's well-being, their relationship, and contributions to society. When one fails to adjust to change and cope with issues in their lives and surroundings, they may be considered mentally unstable, notably when they portray signs of distress, anxiety, mood swings, or unusual behaviors such as substance use and abuse.
Mental disabilities lead to an individual's health concerns such as pain, death, or disability. Mental health includes individuals’ emotional, social, and psychological well-being. One may be considered to face mental concerns when they display signs like isolation from usual activities and people, have low energy, feel hopeless or helpless, become numb to emotional situations, feelings of confusion, upset, worried, on edge, scared, or forgetful, thoughts of self-harm, and inability to perform daily roles like getting to school or work (MentalHealth.gov, 2020). When people display such signs, it is deemed that they have developed mental challenges. There are numerous mental disorders, including depression, dementia, bipolar, schizophrenia, and autism. Mental disabilities are believed to be caused by exposure to stressful environmental situations, genes, and nutrition.
In 2020, the world was believed to have been exposed to mental concerns due to the Covid-19 pandemic. The pandemic has stirred tension across the world; with a virus on the loop, spreading fast and terminating lives within a few hours or days, the pandemic has increased panic across nations. Covid-19 is a health factor existing all over people's surroundings that threatens the mental well-being of people. People are affected psychologically because of developing excessive thoughts over the illness while lacking a control measure. Even though there have been developments in the production of vaccines to protect people, individuals still debate about the safety of the vaccine rather than their preliminary worry, the coronavirus within their surroundings. This paper focuses on the effect of coronavirus on people’s mental health. The paper will also explain the current public situation, the effect of the virus on society, the debatable issue on the existing Covid-19 vaccine, and a proposal for guiding public health professionals.
Covid-19 Crisis on Mental Health
The coronavirus is a global health emergency that is deemed to have adverse mental health impacts on people. The first case was reported in China, in Wuhan, Hubei, in December 2019 as a case of pneumonia of an unknown class (Shereen et al., 2020, p. 92). Since the first case report, the virus has rapidly spread throughout China and other nations worldwide. In Europe, Italy was the first European state to experience the harsh and severe pandemic impacts that led to massive loss of lives. In 2020, on 9th March, Italy imposed a national lockdown to contain the nation's disease (Rossi et al., 2020, p. 2). The lockdown measure was also applied by other nations worldwide, with some countries reluctant to employ the safety measure. The lockdown measure impacted travel and leisure, school, and businesses across all industries.
The first safety measure applied by World Health Organization (WHO) was to stay home to guarantee individual safety. Self-isolation was a strategic measure to curb the deadly virus. People who reported having symptoms of the virus were forced to have isolation under observation in a contained area to ensure the disease does not spread to the uninfected persons. The virus is considered deadly because it spreads fast by touching contaminated areas and contacting infected persons. Regardless, the safety of people is considered crucial above other factors like social life. Since 2020, the world is still battling the pandemic with containment measures. The safety measures are deemed to be cause mental concerns. Since people are compelled to avoid social environments and isolate themselves at home for their safety, individuals start to develop anxiety, fear, and endless thoughts on the virus (Rossi et al., 2020, p. 2). Besides, misinformation on the internet heightens the anxiety and fear in people, leading to depression.
Self-isolation (quarantine) when one developed signs of the virus led to a depressive situation in communities. Based on a study conducted in China on 1210 respondents regarding the impacts of covid-19 on individual mental health, 30% of the results indicated anxiety and 17% depression symptoms (Rossi et al., 2020, p. 4). The suspected mental disorder results are due to the employed preventive and intervention measures applied to people at higher risks.
In Italy, people developed mental disability symptoms due to the lockdown that was imposed on the nation. The lockdown measures highly impacted people in Italy because individuals were denied the freedom of movement, making them unable to perform their usual activities like going to work and school (Rossi et al., 2020, p. 4). The measure of compelling people to stay at home heightened fear in Italy when people saw the surge in the Covid-19's cases. Most people's thoughts were negative about when the virus would end their lives and whether they are safe from the virus while locked up at home with their family and relatives, including the aged above 60 years who were considered to be at higher risk when exposed to the deadly disease.
While under lockdown and quarantine, people experienced mental issues due to loss of jobs, financial concerns, family-welfare concerns, and relationship issues. When Italy imposed a lockdown, people did not know the extent of the measure; the world deemed the measure a means of ending the deadly virus. However, as the virus continued to spread, other nations worldwide imposed the same measure to contain the virus. When industries were shut down, most employees stopped receiving salaries; some received half of their pay, while others lost their jobs indefinitely (Pfefferbaum & North, 2020, p. 511). Companies resorted to harsh measures because of the unpredictable state of the virus. The financial crisis drove people to the edge, with individuals developing anxiety, fear, and panic. The hospitality and entertainment sector were affected in most nations (Khan et al., 2020). Governments compelled social, leisure, and entertainment industries to close large-scale meeting arenas. The mental concern of not interacting with friends through sports and other leisure activities led people to a depressing state of mind.
When a family member got exposed to environments at higher risk of contracting the disorder, individuals were forced to go into quarantine along with their family members they had got into physical contact with. With the financial crisis and the health measures catered for personally, life became unbearable to most individuals. Governments claim that self-catering on quarantine expenses was essential to ensure self-responsibility among people.
People in the front-line services, notably the health workers, have experienced excess pressure and stress during this ongoing health pandemic. Nurses, ambulance, paramedics, doctors, and first responders’ staff have portrayed increased rates of anxiety and depression (Pfefferbaum & North, 2020, p. 511). The health workers live in fear of spreading the dealing virus to their loved ones, especially their children and the elderly. Health practitioners in the intensive care unit are at the highest risks because they spend most of their time with covid-19 patients monitoring their health, having little time for rest, heightened fear of contact, and fatigue (Khan et al., 2020). The health workers are exposed to numerous mental health concerns because while their services are crucial to the survival of the virus’ patients, they are forced to isolate themselves from their loved ones to avoid being the source of their unwellness.
The shortage of personal protective equipment (PPEs)led to worldwide intensified fear. In 2020, when the virus was spreading rapidly, the demand for PPEs was heightened while few reliable companies met the production standards of WHO. As a result, the medical practitioners were at risk and feared attending to patients because caring for them would endanger the lives of health practitioners and their loved ones (Khan et al., 2020). The insufficient PPEs made health environments risky for both patients and clinicians who had not been contaminated with the virus. As a result, another prevention and intervention measure of staying home and seeking only essential and emergency medical services was introduced to ensure the safety of patients. Medical workers continuously worried about being infected with the virus, their survival chance before the Covid-19 ends, and the welfare of their loved ones, for those who were breadwinners to their families and relatives.
The mental concern cuts across to students, international learners, or scholars who study away from their homes, within the same jurisdiction. During the measure of lockdown on nations by governments, schools were also forced to shut down. International students were compelled to remain in foreign environments considered at higher risk, like China, away from their loved ones. The fear of being isolated indefinitely from their loved ones posed a mental thre...