The Public’s Knowledge and Compliance with Preventive Measures Related to COVID-19 in Turkey

Background: Coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) which emerged in Wuhan City of China at the end of 2020, on March 11, 2020, was declared as a pandemic by the World Health Organization and the first case was seen in Turkey on the same date.With the declaration of the pandemic and the occurrence of the case in Turkey, information was given on the prevention of the disease through the written and visual media.This study aims to determine how the notifications are received in different target groups and to have an idea about the way to be followed for presenting information in the future epidemic diseases such as COVID-19. Materials and Methods:This research was carried out between 14.11.2020 and 20.11.2020.A questionnaire consisting of 3 parts was used in the research and 3,094 people were included in the sample.The analysis of the data was carried out using the SPSS 25 package program.The total number of correct answers in the questions asked to the participants was accepted as the person's knowledge level of protection from COVID-19 disease.To determine the compliance levels of the participants, they were asked to score their level of compliance with the measures out of 10.Independent sample t-test and One-Way ANOVA were used to compare knowledge and prevention levels with demographic variables.Results: It was found that the knowledge level of women, who were under 65 years old, single, with at least university education and living in a village/town, about protection from COVID-19 disease was higher than the other categories belonging to the same variables.In terms of compliance with the measures, it was determined that women, who were 36-50 years old, married, and residing in the city had higher scores. Conclusion:In our country, it has been determined that the level of knowledge of prevention of COVID-19 disease and the level of compliance with measures differ according to various demographic variables.In raising the awareness of societies in epidemic diseases, considering the gender, age group, marital status, education level, and place of residence of the individuals, it is thought that it is of great importance in terms of epidemic management that it is done to different masses with different methods.