The Global Health Challenge of COVID-19: Pandemic Impacts on Mortality, Economy, and Mental Health

The novel coronavirus (COVID-19) reportedly originated in China towards the end of 2019. It immediately became uncontrollably out of hand in early 2020 as more and more people were infected across the world. Shortly thereafter, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared it to be a pandemic – underscoring the seriousness of the virus. With this declaration, countries across the world were urged by the WHO to impose mandatory lockdowns in the quest to manage the spread of the virus. This, among other things, implied shutting down the economic activities of countries, most of which were still battling to recover from the 2008 global financial crisis that plunged the global economy into recession with deleterious consequences for developing countries. The shutting down of economies complicated and exacerbated the governance challenges of affected countries. The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic (Coronavirus Disease 2019) has become a threat to psychological health as previous research works revealed a profound and wide range of psychosocial impacts on the individual, community, and international levels during past outbreaks of infectious diseases. During previous outbreaks, the psychological impact on the non-infected community revealed significant psychiatric morbidities, negative emotions poor psychosocial and coping responses toward the outbreak of infectious diseases, and consistent worry about contracting the disease. Currently, there is a paucity of information on the psychological impact on the general public, confirmed and suspected cases, medical staff, and law enforcement agents during the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, especially in the context of mental health impact

The Global Health Challenge of COVID-19: Pandemic Impacts on Mortality, Economy, and Mental Health Keywords:

Health care system , coronavirus , psychological impact