Comprehension, Perception, and Practice of Indians about COVID-19 Anticipating the Second Wave of the Pandemic

Abstract

Background: We assessed knowledge, attitudes, practice, and perceptions about COVID-19 among a convenience sample of the general public in India anticipating the second wave of the pandemic. Methods: This questionnaire-based survey was conducted among the general population quarantined at various institutional quarantine facilities in the city of Nagpur, Maharashtra, India. Informed consent was obtained from each participant. The self-designed questionnaire comprised 25 questions regarding knowledge, eight for attitude, and ten for practice. Knowledge questions were responded to on a Yes/No basis with an additional ‘don’t know’ option. The true answer was given 1 point and false/I don’t know answers were given 0 point. Results: The majority of the participants were aware of COVID-19 (97.9%) and did not either wash or knew how to properly dispose of the used mask (88.02%). Only 10.96% of the participants agreed that they verify the social media posts shared over WhatsApp and Facebook on government authentic websites before sharing them with family and friends. Conclusion: Awareness about the virus, modes of spread, good practice, and an optimistic attitude is the prime requisite to curb the spread and to avoid the impending severity anticipating the second wave of the pandemic.

Keywords

• covid-19
• pandemic
• kap
• second wave
• knowledge
• attitude
• practice
• perception