COVID-19 Infection and Prevention. Knowledge, Attitude and Practice Among Egypt population

Abstract

introduction: SARS family are remarkably familiar with humanity and have been attacking for ages and decades, but COVID-19 became one of the most well-known pandemics in human record. In Egypt, there are over [515,645] Cases and [24,613] Deaths up till now.

objectives: This study intends to assess Egypt population's knowledge, practice, and attitude (KAP) to gain a better understanding of their mentality and how they deal with the pandemic, allowing us to identify knowledge gaps and viable methods to close them.

Methodology: A cross-sectional survey of 24 questions was conducted in several governorates to 1009 participants, with a section for socio-demographic data and three others for knowledge, attitude, and practice. Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) was used to analyze the data.

Results: Adherence to wearing masks and physical distancing was exceptional, represented by the rates of (76.6%) and (78.5%) respectively. Vaccination rates were similarly high since (78.8%) received the vaccine or were willing to receive it soon. Almost half of the participants believed that immunity acquired from infection is more protective than immunity provided by the vaccine. Only (31.8%) gave credit to the vaccine for being safe and effective.

Discussion: (Virus is Man-made) hypothesis received a (20.9%) approval score, while (51.5%) suggested that the idea may be correct. Besides, (78.6%) of participants who supported the theory were not approving or not sure about vaccine's safety and a huge proportion of them are refusing vaccination. While getting information from governmental sources correlates with increasing rates of vaccination and trustworthiness of vaccine's safety and efficacy. Other sources (particularly social media) had a direct negative impact on community attitudes toward vaccine.

conclusion: Enforcing government information sources is necessary for further promotion of vaccine among public.