Something the media doesn’t always like to talk about is the mental toll the coronavirus pandemic has taken on so many Americans. COVID-19 has touched pretty much every person, mentally, and it shows in a recent study.
Sleep troubles, feelings of hopelessness, and other depression symptoms have more than tripled in all demographic groups since the pandemic began. Signs of depression also include loss of interest in things that bring them joy, lethargy, lack of concentration, or thinking about self-harm.
The CIDRAP (Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy) conducted a survey from March 31 to April 13 with data involving 1,441 respondents. The topic was about COVID-19 life stressors impact on mental health and well-being.
The results showed that 27.8% of adults reported depression symptoms, in contrast to a 2017-18 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey where only 8.5% of adults reported depression symptoms. Increases were higher across the spectrum of depression severity, from mild to severe.
Women were shown to have more depression symptoms before and during the pandemic than men. 10.1% of women had depression symptoms before the pandemic, vs 22.2% of women during the pandemic. Men were at 6.9% for depression symptoms before the pandemic, vs 21.9% during the pandemic.
Respondents who were married saw a lower rate of depression symptoms, compared to those who were widowed, divorced, separated, or just never married.
Another part of the study looked at respondents with lower incomes. Those with less than $5,000 in savings were 1.5 times more likely to report depression symptoms, while those with higher numbers of stressors were 3.1 times more likely.
Due to massive social and economic disruptions around the world, COVID-19 has presented an important mental health implication. Residents facing the increasing risk of eviction from their housing, state and federal policies not protecting the people from housing insecurity, and returning to work have been a few of the key factors in play with how little the world has prepped for mental health implications during a pandemic.
This isn’t the first time a disease outbreak has affected human lives mentally. Back in 2003 during the SARS outbreak, 31% of Toronto residents who had been forced to quarantine had symptoms of depression and 29% had signs of PTSD. During the 2015 Ebola epidemic, nearly half of the people living in Sierra Leone had at least one sign of anxiety or depression.
It’s time to open our businesses and schools again. People need to feel a sense of belonging and social structure in a world practically on the edge. Let’s hope the liberals read into this study and realize what they are doing is absolutely catastrophic. Perhaps worse than the coronavirus itself.
