COVID-19 Pandemic: A Serious Threat for Public Mental Health Globally.

Deep emotion traumas in societies around the globe are overcome by extreme human catastrophes such as natural disasters, social crises, war conflicts and infectious virus induced pandemic diseases, etc., can lead to enormous stress-related disorders. The current ongoing pandemic known as COVID-19 caused by novel Corona virus first appeared in Wuhan, city of China and then rapidly spread in the whole world. It has affected various frontiers of lives and caused numerous psychiatric problems like nervousness, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), fear and uncertainty, panic attacks, depression, obsessive compulsory disorder, xenophobia and racism, etc. Globally COVID-19 has persuaded public mental health crisis. Furthermore, inadequate resources of public mental health services in several countries are discussed in this review, which will be further straighten by the upcoming increase in demand for mental health services due to the COVID-19 pandemic. All mental health sciences including Psychiatry can play a very important role in the comfort of COVID-19 infected individuals and their relatives, healthcare providers and society. We need to learn more about psychological and psychiatric features of COVID-19 from the perceptions of public and global mental health in order to cope up the present deteriorating situation caused by the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic.

Elucidation of correlation between SARS-CoV-2 RdRp and N gene cycle threshold (Ct) by RT-PCR with age and gender.

BACKGROUND: Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID19) caused by the new severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARSCoV2) is a global public health emergency. Age and gender are two important factors related to the risk and outcome of various diseases. Cycle threshold (Ct) value is believed to have relation with age and gender. OBJECTIVE: This study has been conducted to investigates the association between SARS-CoV-2 cycle threshold to age and gender of COVID-19 patients, to investigate whether the population-wide change of SARSCoV2 RTPCR Ct value over time is corelated to the number of new COVID19 cases and to investigate the dynamic of RdRp and N genes. METHODS: 72,811 individuals from second wave of COVID19, were observed in current study at Pure Health Lab, Mafraq Hospital, Abu Dhabi, UAE. RESULTS: 15,201/72,811 (21 %) positivity was observed. COVID-19 were more prevalent in males (59.35%) as compared to female (40.65%). The Positivity rate were significantly higher in Male than in Female cases (p-Value = 0.04). The Ct values for both targets of all the samples were ranged from 4.57 to 29.73. Longitudinal analysis showed significant increased during the study period from starting to end as were hypothesized. Interestingly, both the targets (RdRp and N) were present in age < 1 year. Which may indicate that mutated strains are not prevalent in children's < 1 year. CONCLUSION: There was no statistically significant difference in viral loads in between age-groups. Males were tending to higher viral load compared to females. The findings have implications for preventive strategies.

Mental health crisis in pregnant women during current COVID-19 pandemic

Even though for majority of women pregnancy period is a blessed period of their life but a few expecting women encountered a range of negative emotions in those ninth months which lead to depression and anxiety. Maternal mental health issues are interlinked with both short- and long-term health risks for the affected female parent and as well as for the child. The entire health and functional performance of the mother along with the children's mental, physiological and cognitive development is affected by the disrupting mental health situation of the mother. The risks of morbidities which are caused by the psychological problems such as intense stress, natural disasters and accidents and conflict situation could be increased among the perinatal mothers. As a result, it is possible that obstetric women are more exposed to mental health related issues during the pandemic of COVID-19. It is concluded that development of appropriate strategies is important to reduce stress by diagnosing and managing mental health diseases in new mothers without delay at the time of pandemic. Screening techniques based on internet, online counseling and web-related psychological assistance and therapeutic interventions might produce a significant role in this regard. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved)

Mental health crisis of Pakistanis population during COVID-19 pandemic

The first country that was affected by pandemic of SARS-CoV-2 was China. Several exclusive features of SARS-CoV-2 pandemic and its managing policies globally provoked a sharp public mental health crisis. Pakistan is one of the endemic countries for various infectious diseases and has experienced many outbreaks and epidemics every year which effects it's economy and social life (WHO 2016). SARS-CoV-2 is considered as more contagious than MERS and SARS, with case fatality rate of (6.92%). The ambiguous incubation period and likely asymptomatic transmission of the virus have induced anxiety and fear in the public of Pakistan. Second, extraordinary large scale quarantine actions in all main cities, which basically restrict peoples to their families, caused negative psycho-social impact on citizens. Third, reports of deficiencies personal protective equipment's, medical staff, hospital beds, isolation wards, medicines and sanitizers in Pakistan provoked panic in public. Last, a surplus of misinformation on NEWS and social media increased the fear in public (WHO 2019) and poses major risk to public psychological healthiness during this health crisis. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved)

Coronavirus Pandemic: a major public health crisis for the developed and developing world.

Pandemic of novel Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infections in China is now become global public health crisis. At present 87.64% of the world is infected by this deadly illness. The risk from this epidemic depends on the nature of the virus, including how well it transmits from person to person, and the complications resulting from this current illness. The novel coronavirus has killed thousands of people in China and other countries as well; its rate of mortality is increasing day by day. There is an urgent need to control the virus by developing vaccine or any other antiviral drugs to save the world from this deadly viral infection.