Mental health of the people of northern Iran during the quarantine time of 2020 following the coronavirus epidemic

Coronavirus (COVID‑19) is an infectious respiratory disease. Quarantine is often accompanied by unpleasant experiences for those who go through it. The aim of this study was to determine the mental health status of people during quarantine in northern Iran.

This cross‑sectional study was conducted during the quarantine period of coronavirus. Conventional sampling was done from March 6 to April 6. Six hundred and forty‑two individuals were included. Inclusion criteria were living in Sari and being home quarantined during the corona outbreak. Exclusion criteria included hospitalization history due to corona and unwillingness to participate in the study. In this study, the General Health Questionnaire‑28 was used online to collect the required data. To analyze the data, descriptive and inferential statistics (t‑test, analysis of variance, and correlation coefficient) were used.

In this study, individuals were included in the investigation with a mean age of 38.74 ± 11.89 (ranged from 15 to 73). Most of the participants were female (72.85%) and married (71.34%). According to the results, 21.5% of the participants had poor mental health. Mean mental health scores have a statistically significant relationship with gender, marital status, education, occupation, quarantine period, patients with corona, and exposure to a patient with corona (P ≤ 0.05). Furthermore, a negative correlation coefficient was observed between age and mental health score (correlation coefficient = −0.31, significance >0.001).

The average score of mental health has a significant relationship with gender, marital status, education, occupation, quarantine period, corona, and exposure to a patient with corona. Given the high prevalence of mental disorders in people during the COVID‑19 epidemic, educating people and planning to reduce the psychological effects of the epidemic can be helpful.