Six months after its initial launch, a Montreal-led international survey of global attitudes around the COVID-19 pandemic is yielding tangible and useful results. It also reflects the wide range of responses from the global population seen since much of the world went into lockdown this spring.
The overall results are encouraging, says Simon Bacon, professor of health, kinesiology and applied physiology in the Faculty of Arts and Science. He and Kim Lavoie, a professor of psychology at UQAM, are the survey’s principal investigators.
Bacon reports that in most countries, the vast majority of people are doing the right things, such as following government and health authority directives designed to limit the virus’s spread. “People are engaging.”
However, he warns of evidence that, after half a year of observing social distancing, working remotely and wearing masks, a fatigue is setting in. Respondents say they are following safety measures less rigorously. Plus there is a persistent portion of people, about 12 to 25 per cent, who are not self-isolating even if they believe or know they have contracted the virus.
“These tend to be men more often than women, usually in their 20s and early 30s,” Bacon says. “They are a key group of people we need to re-engage with.”