Psychological State and Low Immunity during Corona Season in KSA

Background: In March 2020, WHO declared COVID-19 as pandemic with very high incidence of case-fatality, after that COVID-19 Pandemic was found in China, Europe and USA where these regions were the most affected areas. The new virus attack patients with low-immunity than healthier population causing many psychological conditions. In this study, we aimed to assess prevalence of patient have low immunity symptoms, determine general psychological state in corona season, and demographic factors affecting both variable.

Methodology: This is an analytical cross-sectional study conducted in kingdom of Saudi Arabia (General population) from 19/7/2020 till 25/10/2020. The study depended on online self-report questionnaire which assessing demographic factors including age and nationality besides disease-related information.

Results: We had received 228 responses to our questionnaire where three quarter of them were female (75.9%). 21.1% of the participants were between 19-25 years old while 19.7% were between 36-40 while most of the sample had bachelor (73.7%). It was found that the most common symptoms were having trouble sleeping, low energy, felling tired, having to change the diet and having asthma where 8.8% had at least one symptom, 8.3% had two symptoms and 14.2% had 3 or more symptoms. Considering psychological status, we had found that the most common symptoms reported by participants were concerning about future, the always need for naps and caffeine, afraid of getting sick, afraid of worsen health, and extreme mood change. It was found that gender had a significant effect on developing both low immunity and poor psychological status (P=0.029, 0.02) where female seems to have more low immunity and poorer psychological status than male. Age is another significant factor in determining low immunity and poor psychological status (P=0.026, 0.001) where younger participants reported more symptoms of low immunity and poor psychological than older participants where the most affected age interval was 19-25 years old.

Conclusion: we had found high prevalence of low immune status and poor psychological status which were more associated with females and younger populations. Moreover, there is a significant correlation between poor psychological status and low immune status.