Altaher A M, Elottol A E Y, Jebril M A, Aliwaini S H
Department of Medical Sciences, University College of Science & Technology-Khan Younis, Gaza, Palestine.
Global Health Institute, School of Public Health, Xi'an Jiaotong University, Xi'an, China.
New Microbes New Infect. 2021 Mar 25;41:100876. doi: 10.1016/j.nmni.2021.100876. eCollection 2021 May.
Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has spread worldwide and become an emerging life-threatening pandemic disease since 2019. This study aimed to evaluate the basic knowledge, awareness, personal hygiene and healthy practices regarding COVID-19 during its outbreak among the Palestinian population in the Gaza Strip. It is a cross-sectional survey carried out between July and August 2020 and included 458 participants, aged 18 years or older, belonging to the five Gaza Strip governorates, Palestine, with a variety of socio-economic status. Sociodemographic data and data on COVID-19 knowledge, awareness, personal hygiene and healthy practices were collected via email and social media applications (WhatsApp and Facebook) from the study participants. Statistical analyses were performed using Vr 22 of the SPSS software. Overall, the mean ± SD age of the participants was 26.5 ± 4.2 years. Our findings showed that most of the Gazan adults had very good knowledge regarding COVID-19 in terms of host sources, causative agents, incubation period, symptoms, transmission, treatment and prevention. Additionally, most of the participants had a high level of personal hygiene and healthy practices during the COVID-19 outbreak, where personal hygiene and healthy practices against COVID-19 was 77.4%. Furthermore, a higher educational level did not affect the quality of personal hygiene and healthy practice behaviours during the COVID-19 outbreak. Although most of the Gazans had good knowledge regarding the healthy practices, a significant percentage of the population did not practice the hygiene protocol. Despite the majority of the Gazan population having very good knowledge regarding COVID-19 and a high level of personal hygiene and healthy practices during the COVID-19 outbreak, a small proportion require education about avoiding physical contact and maintaining social distancing with others during the pandemic.
2019年冠状病毒病（COVID-19）自2019年以来已在全球蔓延，成为一种新出现的危及生命的大流行病。本研究旨在评估COVID-19疫情期间加沙地带巴勒斯坦人群对该疾病的基本知识、认知、个人卫生和健康行为。这是一项于2020年7月至8月进行的横断面调查，纳入了458名年龄在18岁及以上、来自巴勒斯坦加沙地带五个省份、具有不同社会经济地位的参与者。通过电子邮件以及社交媒体应用程序（WhatsApp和Facebook）收集了研究参与者的社会人口学数据以及关于COVID-19知识、认知、个人卫生和健康行为的数据。使用SPSS软件的Vr 22进行统计分析。总体而言，参与者的平均年龄±标准差为26.5±4.2岁。我们的研究结果表明，大多数加沙成年人在COVID-19的宿主来源、病原体、潜伏期、症状、传播、治疗和预防方面有非常良好的知识。此外，在COVID-19疫情期间，大多数参与者有较高水平的个人卫生和健康行为，其中针对COVID-19的个人卫生和健康行为占77.4%。此外，较高的教育水平在COVID-19疫情期间并未影响个人卫生和健康行为的质量。尽管大多数加沙人对健康行为有良好的认知，但仍有相当比例的人口未遵循卫生规范。尽管大多数加沙人口在COVID-19疫情期间对COVID-19有非常良好的知识以及较高水平的个人卫生和健康行为，但仍有一小部分人需要接受关于在疫情期间避免身体接触和与他人保持社交距离的教育。
