Background: Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) is a global public health agenda with high level of pandemicity. There is no effective treatment, but prevention strategies can alter the pandemic. However, the effectiveness of existing preventive measures and strategies is inconclusive. Therefore, this study aimed to review evidence related to COVID-19 prevention achieved through social distancing, stay at home, travel ban and lockdown in order to determine best practices. Methods/design: This review has been conducted in accordance with the PRISMA and Cochrane guideline. A systematic literature search of articles archived from major medical databases (MEDLINE, SCOPUS, CINAHL, PsycINFO, and Web of Science) and Google scholar was done. Observational and modeling researches published to date with information on COVID-19 prevention like social distancing, stay at home, travel ban and lockdown were included. The articles were screened by two experts. Risk of bias of included studies was assessed through ROBINS-I tool and the certainty of evidence was graded using the GRADE approach for the main outcomes. The findings were presented by narration and in tabular form. Results: A total of 25 studies was included in the review. The studies consistently reported the benefit of social distancing, stay at home, travel restriction and lockdown measures. Mandatory social distancing reduced the daily growth rate by 9.1%, contacts by 7–9 folds, median number of infections by 92% and epidemic resolved in day 90. Travel restriction and lockdown averted 70.5% of exported cases in china and doubling time was increased from 2 to 4 days. It reduced contacts by 80% and decreased the initial R₀, and the number of infected individuals decreased by 91.14%. Stay at home was associated with a 48.6 and 59.8% reduction in weekly morbidity and fatality. Obligatory, long term and early initiated programs were more effective. Conclusion: Social distancing, stay at home, travel restriction and lockdown are effective to COVID-19 prevention. The strategies need to be obligatory, initiated early, implemented in large scale, and for a longer period of time. Combinations of the programs are more effective. However, the income of individuals should be guaranteed and supported.

Purpose: With prevention being the only and best available intervention, COVID-19 has recently become a global threat, having had and continuing to have enormous health, economic, and societal impacts. Evidence so far has documented a heightened risk of mortality to people with chronic conditions. There is a dearth of evidence regarding chronic disease patients’ intention and practice on the preventive measures. This study tried to fill this gap by assessing the intention to practice and practice on personal preventive measures (PPMs) among adults with chronic conditions. Materials and Methods: A facility-based cross-sectional study was conducted in Southern Ethiopia among 806 adults with chronic conditions by employing a multistage sampling technique. Data were collected using a pre-tested and structured questionnaire. Statistical analysis was done using IBM SPSS software version 25. Binary logistic regression analysis was done to identify factors associated with intention and practice. Level of statistical significance was declared at a P-value of less than 0.05. Results: The study showed that 52% (95% CI=47.61– 54.80) and 76.3% (95% CI=73.36– 79.24) of adults with chronic conditions were intending to practice and had ever practiced the personal preventive measures. Participants’ subjective norm (SN) (AOR=4.94; 95% CI=3.49– 6.96) and perceived behavioral control (PBC) (AOR=4.13; 95% CI=2.69– 6.34) were the factors associated with their intention. Good knowledge and a positive attitude were found to be significant factors associated with the participants’ actual practice of the PPMs among other independent factors. Conclusion: Around half of the participants were intending to practice PPMs, and three-quarters had good practice on the PPMs against COVID-19. Interventions targeted to improve intention and practice on the PPMs need to take into account improving knowledge and attitude, and build positive subjective norms and heighten the confidence to control the preventive behaviors.

Low birth weight is a global public health problem having various severe and life-threatening health effects. The World Health Organization is working to reduce the prevalence of low birth weight to 30% by the year 2025. Pinpointing the determinants of low birth weight at different scenarios is crucial to reduce the rate of low birth weight in low-income countries which consist of 96.5% of global low birth weight newborns. Thus, the aim of this study was to assess determinants of low birth weight in Sidama Zone public hospitals of South Ethiopia. An institution-based case-control study was conducted from March 1 to May 5, 2019, in Sidama Zone public hospitals. Data were collected from 354 mother-neonate samples with 118 of them having newborns with birthweight<2500g (cases) and 236 of them having birthweight≥2500g (controls) using a pretested, interviewer-administered structured questionnaire and medical record review. The odds of being rural dweller women was 3.51 times higher among cases (low birth weight babies) than among controls (normal birth weight babies) as compared to being urban dweller women (AOR=3.51, 95% CI (1.91-6.45)). The likelihood of initiating antenatal care late was 3.22 times more among cases than among controls when compared with timely initiation of antenatal care (AOR=3.22, 95% CI (1.47-7.14)). The probability of having pregnancy-induced hypertension was 4.49 times higher among mothers of the cases than among mothers of the controls as compared to not having pregnancy-induced hypertension (AOR=4.49, 95% CI (1.94-10.38)). The odds of not taking iron and folic acid during pregnancy was 3.92 times higher among mothers of the cases than mothers of the controls when compared with taking iron and folic acid (AOR=3.92, 95% CI (1.80-8.50)). The likelihood of having Mid-Upper Arm Circumference MUAC<23cm was 4.27 times higher among mothers of the cases than among mothers of the controls as compared to having MUAC≥23cm (AOR=4.27, 95% CI (2.24-8.12)). The probability of having inadequate dietary diversity was 3.75 times higher among cases than among controls as compared to having adequate dietary diversity (AOR=3.75, 95% CI (1.64-8.57)). Interventions targeting the aversion of low birth weight should focus on promotion of iron-folic acid supplementation and dietary diversification through timely initiation of antenatal care.

Background: Healthcare workers (HCWs) are among the many groups of people who are in the frontline caring for people and facing heavy workloads, life-or-death decisions, risk of infection, and have been facing various psychosocial problems. So, monitoring mental health issues to understand the mediating factors and inform evidence-based interventions in a timely fashion is vital. Purpose: This study aimed to assess generalized anxiety disorder and its associated factors among HCWs fighting COVID-19 in Southern Ethiopia. Patients and Methods: An institution-based cross-sectional study was conducted among 798 HCWs from 20 May to 20 June 2020. A pre-tested and structured interviewer-administered KOBO collect survey tool was used to collect data. The study participants were selected using a simple random sampling technique by allocating a proportion to each health institute. The association between the level of generalized anxiety disorder and its independent variables was examined by ordinal logistic regression. Assumptions for the proportional odds model were checked using parallel line tests. An adjusted proportional odds ratio with a 95% CI was used to calculate the strength of the statistical association between the independent and dependent variables. Results: The prevalence of mild and moderate anxiety disorder among HCWs was 29.3% and 6.3%, respectively. Contact with confirmed or suspected cases (aPOR =1.97; 95% CI: 1.239, 3.132), no COVID-19 updates (aPOR=4.816, 95% CI=2.957, 7.842), no confidence on coping with stresses (aPOR=2.74, 95% CI=1.633, 4.606), and COVID-19-related worry (aPOR=1.85, 95% CI=1.120, 3.056) were positively associated with higher-order anxiety disorder. However, not feeling overwhelmed by the demands of everyday life (aPOR=0.52, 95% CI=0.370, 0.733) and feeling cannot make it (aPOR=0.44, 95% CI=0.308, 0.626) were negatively associated with a higher order of anxiety. Conclusion: The study revealed that the prevalence of anxiety disorder among HCWs was high in the study area. The findings of the current study suggest immediate psychological intervention for health care workers in the study area is vital. Therefore, proactive measures should be taken by the stakeholders at different hierarchies to promote the psychological wellbeing of HCWs in order to control the impact of the pandemic on the HCWs, and containing the pandemic.

Background: The postpartum intrauterine contraceptive device (PPIUCD) is an effective, reliable, safe and recommended contraceptive method for the postpartum women. However, only a small proportion of women who gave birth at health facilities in the world have used it. There are limited studies about determinants of PPIUCD utilization. Therefore, this study aimed to assess determinants of postpartum IUCD utilization among mothers who gave birth in Gamo zone health facilities, southern Ethiopia. Methods: A facility based unmatched case-control study was done at Gamo zone public health facilities, southern Ethiopia. Data were collected using a pretested interviewer-administered questionnaire from March 1 to April 15, 2019. The data were coded, cleaned and entered into Epi-Info version 3.5.1 and exported to SPSS version 25 for advanced analysis. Binary logistic regression was performed to identify the determinants of PPIUCD utilization. Results: A total of 510 (175 cases and 335 controls) participants were involved in the study yielding a response rate of 95.1%. Partner support for IUCD insertion (AOR [95% CI]: 10 [4.03, 24.3]), birth interval (AOR [95% CI]: 9.7 [1.7, 55.1]), fertility plan (AOR [95% CI]: 4 [1.44, 10.84]), and timing of counseling (AOR [95% CI]:1.25 [0.034, 0.46]) are the determinant factors for postpartum IUCD. Conclusion and Recommendation: Birth interval, fertility plan, timing of counseling, pregnancy plan and partner support were the determinant factors identified in this study. Therefore, counseling of both partners during antenatal follow-up, delivery and immediately after delivery by health professionals are recommended.

Background: Since the occurrence of the COVID-19 pandemic, different public health measures have been implemented to prevent and control the further spread of the disease. However, barriers that influence the effective implementation of public health measures were not explore in Ethiopia especially in study Area. Therefore, this study tried to fill this gap by exploring the barriers to effective implementation of public health measures for prevention and control of the COVID-19 pandemic in the Gamo Zone of southern Ethiopia. Methods: The study employed a qualitative study with a phenomenology approach among purposely selected 30 individuals in the community and selected institutions. Key informant interview was used to collect the data. The data were transcribed verbatim and translated into the English language. The transcribed data were read several times to clearly understand the content for further analysis. The analysis of the data was conducted based on the modified Tanahashi framework. Results: The study identified different barriers under five main themes: accessibility, acceptability, availability, contact and use, and effective implementation of public health measures related to barriers. The main barriers to effective implementation of public health measures were resistance to change, negligence, lack of community engagement, insufficient training for front line workers, poor supportive supervision, poor law enforcement, and lack of continuous community awareness creation. Beside, acceptability related barriers like cultural and religious norms and availability related barriers like shortage of personal protective equipment and shortage of skilled health professional have also lion share barriers for implementation of the public health measures. Conclusion: The study identified different personal, institutional, and societal level barriers for effective implementation of public health measures for the COVID-19 pandemic. Therefore, proper and targeted continuous community awareness creation with further mandatory law enforcement activities should be implemented by the concerned bodies to mitigate individual and societal level barriers. In addition, the government with relevant stakeholders should give due attention to equip and protect the frontline professionals by availing the necessary logistic and provision of continuous capacity-building activities.