Acta Scientific Neurology (ISSN: 2582-1121) Volume 3 Issue 8 August 2020 COVID 19 Pandemic Anxiety and its Management Suprakash Chaudhury 1 *, Pooja V 1 , Mahesh Thakur 2 and Daniel Saldanha 1 1 Department of Psychiatry, Dr D Y Patil Medical College, Hospital and Research Centre, Dr D Y Patil University, Pimpri, Pune, India 2 Department of Social Work, Karve Institute of Social Service, Pune, India *Corresponding Author: Suprakash Chaudhury, Department of Psychiatry, Dr D Y Patil Medical College, Hospital and Research Centre, Dr D Y Patil University, Pimpri, Pune, India. Short Communication Received: July 01, 2020 Published: July 30, 2020 © All rights are reserved by Suprakash Chaudhury., et al. The new decade brought with it the first pandemic of the social- media age - Coronavirus Disease 2019, popularly referred to as COVID-19. Despite similarities with the 2003 SARS pandemic, CO- VID-19 has much higher infectivity but lower mortality than SARS. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), a total of 8422 people worldwide were affected with SARS, with 916 deaths. CO- VID-19, on the other hand, has already affected more than 10 mil- lion and had over 500,000 deaths. The sudden outbreak of a serious respiratory illness in China followed by rapid spread to other parts of the world prompted researchers to study the disease and to isolate the virus without much delay. We now know that the disease is caused by a previ- ously unknown virus: 2019-nCoV or SARS-CoV2. Being a new vi- rus very little was known about its nature. The resulting vague- ness about the illness resulted in excessive psychological stress on people. With the WHO initially delaying and then declaring it a pandemic on 11 th March 2020, there was a swift rise of fear and anxiety among the general population [1,2]. The COVID-19 Pandemic is likely to evoke questions within the minds of a vast number of individuals across the globe due to its high degree of communicability and an apparently greater fatality rate compared to many other flu-causing viruses. No specific medi- cations against COVID 19 are available presently. A vaccine against it has also not been developed thus far. The only known methods to prevent the disease are non-pharmacological measures like avoiding contact with infected person, social distancing, use of face masks, through hand-washing with soap and water or alcohol based sanitizers, etc. These measures would help to prevent the spread of infection to a great extent. However, many people would start “worrying” if they would contract the illness; a common sce- nario that can occur in infectious outbreaks when people experi- ence heightened anxiety but are still managing to carry on [3]. The symptoms of anxiety include: • Worry, anxiety or sadness of mood, fear of contracting an infection. • Persistent preoccupation with illness worry. • Feeling distressed, tearful, and sad. Disinterest in activities that one used to enjoy. • Above symptoms may be associated with truancy or oppo- sitional behaviour in adolescents, persistent nervousness, tension. • Restlessness or feeling on edge • Irritability • Muscles feeling tense and tight • Poor concentration • Sleep and Appetite disturbances. • Physical symptoms such as increased heart rate, excessive sweating, feeling light-headed, stomach upset and fatigue [4,5]. During an epidemic of an infective disease, the mental state of the people have an important role in determining not only the ex- tent of the epidemic but also the incidence of psychological distress and disorder during and after the outbreak. DOI: 10.31080/ASNE.2020.03.0208 Citation: Suprakash Chaudhury., et al. “COVID 19 Pandemic Anxiety and its Management”. Acta Scientific Neurology 3.8 (2020): 39-41.