Prevalence and influencing factors of pandemic fatigue during normalized COVID-19 containment among the public in China: an online cross-sectional survey

Abstract

ObjectiveTo investigate the prevalence of pandemic fatigue and its associates during the period of normalized containment of coronavirus diease 2019 (COVID-19) among the public in China. MethodsThrough an online survey platform ‘Wenjuanxing’ and with self-designed questionnaires on demographics, COVID-19-related risk perception, protective behaviors, negative emotion, and pandemic fatigue, we conducted a self-administered survey during February – March 2021 among web users aged 18 years and above in five provincial level administrative divisions across China. The collected data were analyzed with descriptive statistics, chi-square test and logistic regression analysis. Results Of 4 325 participants with eligible responses, 1 082 (25.0%) reported pandemic fatigue symptoms; 1 844 (42.6%) reported only having psychosomatic fatigue and 1 050 (24.3%) only having information fatigue. The results of logistic regression analysis revealed that the participants with following characteristics were more likely to have pandemic fatigue symptoms: with poor health status (odds ratio [OR] = 1.838, 95% confidence interval [ 95%CI]: 1.575 – 2.144), having a higher perceived susceptibility to COVID-19 (OR = 1.435, 95%CI: 1.236 – 1.667), having a lower perceived controllability of COVID-19 (OR = 1.760, 95%CI: 1.495 – 2.070), and with highly negative emotion (OR = 3.493, 95%CI: 2.987 – 4.086). Conclusion Pandemic fatigue symptoms were prevalent during the period of COVID-19 containment and the symptoms were associated with self-reported health status, perceived controllability and susceptibility of COVID-19, and negative emotion among adult web users in China.

Keywords

• covid-19 epidemic
• the public
• pandemic fatigue