A cross-sectional survey of psychological distress in a Mexican sample during the second phase of the COVID-19 pandemic

Abstract

The objectives of this study were to describe severity of psychological distress (event-related stress, anxiety, and depression) during the second stage of COVID-19 pandemic in Mexico, and to explore associations between the indicators of psychological distress, sociodemographic characteristics and specific concerns about COVID-19. This report serves as a baseline measure of a longitudinal project to evaluate progression of psychological distress across stages of the COVID-19 pandemic in Mexico. An online survey was conducted in the State of Mexico from April 8th -18th, 2020, in a sample of men and women who are beneficiaries of a welfare institution in the region. Variables were measured with the Impact of Event Scale-6, Patient Health Questionnaire-9, General Anxiety Disoder-7, and a questionnaire of concerns about COVID-19. A total of 5974 participants were analyzed. Moderate levels of psychological distress (with 23.6% of participants meeting significant event-related stress, but mild levels of depression and anxiety) were found, as well as high values in all concerns about COVID-19, especially regarding financial disruption, worsening of local security and concern of a family member becoming infected. These concerns associated mild-to-moderately with the indicators of psychological distress. Higher values of event-related distress were found in women, individuals with higher educational attainment and those with any current high-risk medical diagnosis, though the effect sizes were mild. Though psychological distress and concerns about COVID-19 have reached significant levels during the pandemic in Mexico, overall, they have not yet reached dysfunctional levels.

Impact of COVID-19 First Wave on Psychological and Psychosocial Dimensions: A Systematic Review

“…Gender: The findings showed that women had higher levels of depression than men [4,8,10,67,157,186,187,[220][221][222]225,239,242,243,247,254,255,[258][259][260]262,272,307,321,347], in line with pre-COVID-19 literature [353,354]. A prolonged exposure to domestic hostility due to quarantine worsened the symptoms [259].…”

“…Comorbidity: Anxiety [38,96,223,345], stress [214,312], sleep difficulties [223,271], history of mental health issues and chronic illness [220,221,255,259,262,268,310,347,356] were consistent predictors of higher depression during COVID-19 pandemic. These results also are in line with pre-COVID-19 literature [353,354].…”

“…There were a number of dynamics that still impact depression and were increased during the pandemic [6,212,259,310,328]. Among these factors were those related to aspects strictly connected with COVID-19 [24,111,133,157,214,215,220,225,240,243,269,[345][346][347], risk perception and its reactions [96,111,129,133,143,216,247,256,309], low quality of life [55,157,214,243,259,312], and addictions [220,241].…”

“…Age: Age seemed to be significantly associated with depression [157]. Younger people reported a higher prevalence of depressive symptoms during the COVID-19 pandemic [4,7,184,221,225,235,239,242,243,245,[247][248][249]258,347]. Conversely, older people showed lower depression levels [7].…”

“…Social Condition: An association between sociodemographic variables and depression was captured: lower levels of education, unemployment, lower income, living in urban areas, living in crowded areas where it is impossible to maintain social distance, not having a child, having an acquaintance infected with COVID-19 have been associated with higher levels of depression [6,8,67,185,187,226,233,245,247,248,253,264,347]. Remote working was associated with lower depressive symptoms [245], while being a student seemed to be significantly associated with higher levels of depression [4,8,186,254,265,310].…”