This study explored patterns of abuse, self-harm and thoughts of suicide/self-harm in the UK during the first month of the COVID-19 pandemic using data from the COVID-19 Social Study (n=44 775), a non-probability sample weighted to population proportions. The reported frequency of abuse, self-harm and thoughts of suicide/self-harm was higher among women, Black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) groups and people experiencing socioeconomic disadvantage, unemployment, disability, chronic physical illnesses, mental disorders and COVID-19 diagnosis. Psychiatric medications were the most common type of support being used, but fewer than half of those affected were accessing formal or informal support.

Using a national survey of Generation Z conducted in late May 2020, we measure attitudes about the impact of the coronavirus on personal health, financial and job concerns, views about shelter-in-place laws, and 2020 voting intentions. Gen Z women express greater health and economic concerns and support for shelter-in-place measures than their male counterparts, but this gender gap is largely mitigated by party and other covariates. Party also mediates the differences between young male and female voters concerning the influence of the coronavirus on their vote choice in 2020. Notably, women have significantly greater concern about the impact of COVID-19 on their personal financial situation, while Gen Z men express more concern about their personal health amid COVID-19 in more fully specified statistical models. This research contributes to the growing literature that examines not only the sorting effect of party on the gender gap but also how different identities—in this case, generation—can help explain the persistent political divides between men and women.

With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States, many state and local governments were forced to implement necessary policies to contain transmission of the deadly virus. These policies ranged from closing most businesses to more controversial proposals, such as postponing primary elections. In this research note, we examine the role that scientific knowledge and gender played in citizen perceptions of these virus containment policies, both in the general population and among partisans. We find that while a gender gap persists in scientific knowledge, both in the general population and within the parties, women are generally more likely to use this knowledge to inform their policy views on necessary government action during the COVID-19 pandemic. These findings shed light on how knowledge and gender intersect to drive support for government intervention during the time of a severe public health crisis in a partisan America.

The COVID-19 pandemic has altered numerous elements of social, political, and economic life. Mask wearing is arguably an essential component of the new normal until substantial progress is made on a vaccine. However, though evidence suggests the practice is a positive for public health and limiting the transmission of COVID-19, there is variation in attitudes toward and practices of mask wearing. Specifically, there appears to be a sex-based divide in mask wearing, with men more likely to resist wearing masks. Utilizing an original survey, we test the correlation between masculinity and mask wearing. We find that identification with norms of masculinity has a significant influence on affective responses toward mask wearing.

The global coronavirus pandemic has reified divisions, inequity, and injustices rooted in systems of domination such as racism, sexism, neoliberal capitalism, and ableism. Feminist scholars have theorized these interlocking systems of domination as the “continuum of violence.” Building on this scholarship, we conceptualize the U.S. response to and the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic as reflective of the continuum of violence. We argue that crises like pandemics expose the antidemocratic and exclusionary practices inherent in this continuum, which is especially racialized and gendered. To support our argument, we provide empirical evidence of the continuum of violence in relation to COVID-19 vis-à-vis the interrelated issues of militarization and what feminists call “everyday security,” such as public health and gender-based violence. The continuum of violence contributes theoretically and practically to our understanding of how violence that the pandemic illuminates is embedded in broader systems of domination and exclusion.

A central function of democratic institutions is to protect vulnerable populations. The stability and success of these institutions depends, in part, on popular support. Times of crisis can introduce novel dynamics that alter popular support for protective institutions, particularly among those who do not benefit from those protections. We explore this possibility in the context of Title IX's gender equality requirements and infrastructure to address sexual harassment in college sports. We conduct a large survey of college student-athletes to study their attitudes on these issues in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and concomitant financial challenges affecting college sports. We find that male student-athletes and those with sexist attitudes exhibit alarmingly low levels of support for ensuring the maintenance of equality and sexual harassment policy under Title IX during the COVID-19 crisis and eventual recovery. The results accentuate the vulnerability of certain populations during crises and the importance of maintaining strong institutional policy support during such times.

In December 2019, cases of severe coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) infection rapidly progressed to acute respiratory failure. This study aims to assess the association between the neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio (NLR) and the incidence of severe COVID-19 infection. A retrospective cohort study was conducted on 210 patients with COVID-19 infection who were admitted to the Central Hospital of Wuhan from 27 January 2020 to 9 March 2020. Peripheral blood samples were collected and examined for lymphocyte subsets by flow cytometry. Associations between tertiles of NLR and the incidence of severe illness were analysed by logistic regression.

Of the 210 patients with COVID-19, 87 were diagnosed as severe cases. The mean NLR of the severe group was higher than that of the mild group (6.6 vs. 3.3, P < 0.001). The highest tertile of NLR (5.1–19.7) exhibited a 5.9-fold (95% CI 1.3–28.5) increased incidence of severity relative to that of the lowest tertile (0.6–2.5) after adjustments for age, diabetes, hypertension and other confounders. The number of T cells significantly decreased in the severe group (0.5 vs. 0.9, P < 0.001). COVID-19 might mainly act on lymphocytes, particularly T lymphocytes. NLR was identified as an early risk factor for severe COVID-19 illness. Patients with increased NLR should be admitted to an isolation ward with respiratory monitoring and supportive care.

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has resulted in a global pandemic, and there is limited data on effective therapies. Bacillus Calmette–Guérin (BCG) vaccine, a live-attenuated strain derived from an isolate of Mycobacterium bovis and originally designed to prevent tuberculosis, has shown some efficacy against infection with unrelated pathogens. In this study, we reviewed 120 consecutive adult patients (≥18 years old) with COVID-19 at a major federally qualified health centre in Rhode Island, United States from 19 March to 29 April 2020. Median age was 39.5 years (interquartile range, 27.0–50.0), 30% were male and 87.5% were Latino/Hispanics. Eighty-two (68.3%) patients had BCG vaccination. Individuals with BCG vaccination were less likely to require hospital admission during the disease course (3.7% vs. 15.8%, P = 0.019). This association remained unchanged after adjusting for demographics and comorbidities (P = 0.017) using multivariate regression analysis. The finding from our study suggests the potential of BCG in preventing more severe COVID-19.

In this article, we evaluate gender differences in COVID-19 conspiracy theory beliefs. We find that women are significantly less likely than men to endorse COVID-19 conspiracy theories and that this gender difference cuts across party lines. Our analysis suggests that this gender gap is partially explained by two dispositional factors: learned helplessness and conspiratorial thinking. Our findings qualify past work on the antecedents of conspiracy theory beliefs, which does not uncover robust and significant gender differences. The results highlight the need for work in this area to better theorize about the significance of gender.

The United States has the highest number of COVID-19 cases, yet many Americans have responded indifferently toward policies designed to combat the spread of the virus. While nearly all 50 states have implemented some type of stay-at-home policy to encourage social distancing, there has been high variation in the degree of compliance. We argue that this variance is partly driven by gender resentment. Gender resentment reduces trust in female political leaders and thus decreases compliance with government policy and recommendations. Using data from SafeGraph and the 2016 American National Election Study, we demonstrate that the effect of stay-at-home policies on social distancing is reduced when gender resentment increases in states with female leaders. However, when gender resentment is low, there is no difference in the effect of policies on behavior. This research has important implications for understanding unseen barriers that can mediate the efficacy of female political leaders.

The incidence of extensively drug-resistant tuberculosis (XDR-TB) has been rising consistently in Pakistan, and the country is likely to experience another surge of cases in the midst of the COVID-19 crisis. It is imperative to consider how the rising proportion of XDR-TB is best tackled during the pandemic; this includes finding a solution to the problem of non-adherence at the level of community-based healthcare, the utility and practicality of simultaneous testing for COVID-19 and TB, and reconciliation of the World Health Organization’s recommendation of home-based treatment with the need for frequent monitoring of anti-tubercular therapy in XDR-TB. Operational research is needed expeditiously to bypass these limitations.

The paper forms part of a series of papers outlining the theoretical framework for a new model of uncertainty distress (this paper), treatment implications arising from the model, and empirical tests of the model. We define uncertainty distress as the subjective negative emotions experienced in response to the as yet unknown aspects of a given situation. In the first paper we draw on a robust body of research on distinct areas including: threat models of anxiety, perceived illness uncertainty and intolerance of uncertainty. We explore how threat and uncertainty are separable in anxiety and how we can understand behaviours in response to uncertainty. Finally, we propose a clinically, theoretically and empirically informed model for uncertainty distress, and outline how this model can be tested. Caveats, clinical applications and practitioner key points are briefly included, although these are more fully outlined in the treatment implications article. While we outline this model in the context of novel coronavirus (COVID-19), the model has broader applications to both mental and physical health care settings.

The extent to which citizens comply with newly enacted public health measures such as social distancing or lockdowns strongly affects the propagation of the virus and the number of deaths from COVID-19. It is however very difficult to identify non-compliance through survey research because claiming to follow the rules is socially desirable. Using three survey experiments, we examine the efficacy of different ‘face-saving’ questions that aim to reduce social desirability in the measurement of compliance with public health measures. Our treatments soften the social norm of compliance by way of a short preamble in combination with a guilty-free answer choice making it easier for respondents to admit non-compliance. We find that self-reported non-compliance increases by up to +11 percentage points when making use of a face-saving question. Considering the current context and the importance of measuring non-compliance, we argue that researchers around the world should adopt our most efficient face-saving question.

During the novel coronavirus pandemic, early data suggested that men were slightly more likely to contract COVID-19 than women, less likely to seek medical attention for the disease, and far more likely to die as a result of COVID-19. While several studies have explored this gender gap, none has attempted to isolate the psychological processes underpinning this phenomenon. In this research note, I suggest that sexism partly explains these differences. Using data from a large (N = 100,689) survey of American adults conducted between March and June 2020 by the Democracy Fund and the University of California, Los Angeles (Nationscape), I find that sexist beliefs, a component of masculine norms, are consistently the strongest predictor of coronavirus-related emotions, behaviors, policy attitudes, and ultimately contracting COVID-19. This study highlights how gender ideology can impact health and impede government public health efforts.