The untold story of the COVID-19 pandemic: perceptions and views towards social stigma and bullying in the shadow of COVID-19 illness in Jordan.

Autor: Akour A; Department of Biopharmaceutics and Clinical Pharmacy, School of Pharmacy, The University of Jordan, Amman, 11942 Jordan.; Department of Pharmacy, Faculty of Pharmacy, Al-Zaytoonah University of Jordan, Amman, 11942 Jordan., AlMuhaissen SA; Department of Pharmaceutics and Pharmaceutical Technology, School of Pharmacy, The University of Jordan, Amman, Jordan., Nusair MB; Department of Clinical Pharmacy and Pharmacy Practice, Faculty of Pharmacy, Yarmouk University, Irbid, Jordan., Al-Tammemi AB; Department of Epidemiology and Global Health, Umeå University, 90187 Umeå, Sweden.; Department of Family and Occupational Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Debrecen, H-4032 Debrecen, Hungary.; Doctoral School of Health Sciences, University of Debrecen, H-4032 Debrecen, Hungary., Mahmoud NN; Department of Pharmacy, Faculty of Pharmacy, Al-Zaytoonah University of Jordan, Amman, 11942 Jordan., Jalouqa S; Department of Pharmaceutics and Pharmaceutical Technology, School of Pharmacy, The University of Jordan, Amman, Jordan., Alrawashdeh MN; Department of Sociology, School of Arts, The University of Jordan, Amman, Jordan.
Jazyk: angličtina
Zdroj: SN social sciences [SN Soc Sci] 2021; Vol. 1 (9), pp. 240. Date of Electronic Publication: 2021 Sep 27.
DOI: 10.1007/s43545-021-00252-0
Abstrakt: Stigmatization towards COVID-19 patients can lead to negative outcomes like social exclusion and bullying, and it may hinder the willingness of people to undergo testing. This study aimed to measure and explore the perception of stigmatization and bullying towards COVID-19 patients in Jordan. This was a web-based cross-sectional survey. Participants were recruited from social media platforms employing a snowball convenience sampling. The perception of bullying, beliefs regarding social consequences of infection, views on measures towards violators of patients' privacy, and how to reduce the stigma were assessed by self-reported measures. 397 participants returned completed questionnaires. The majority of respondents believed that COVID-19 patients in Jordan are getting bullied ( n  = 255, 64.3%) and over 80% believed that people enjoy sharing identities, or news about COVID-19 patients. Although most respondents had adequate knowledge regarding transmission/prevention of COVID-19, they believed that all or some of the COVID-19 patients practiced something wrong to get infected ( n  = 358, 90.2%). Moreover, 86.9% of respondents reported that people in Jordan were crossing their lines with bullying behaviors towards COVID-19 patients. However, these negative views would not discourage most respondents to get tested and follow the government's instructions if they or any of their acquaintances were suspected to be infected. Our study sheds the light on a high degree of stigma and bullying of COVID-19 patients during the early stage of the pandemic in Jordan. Hence, there is a need to develop and implement effective anti-stigma/anti-bullying campaigns that refute the misperception, raise public knowledge about COVID-19, and spread encouraging messages.
Competing Interests: Conflict of interestThe authors have no conflicts of interest to declare that are relevant to the content of this article.
(© The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021.)
Databáze: MEDLINE
Externí odkaz: