Collaborative Outcomes study on Health and Functioning during Infection Times (COH-FIT): Uganda

The COVID-19 pandemic has grown rapidly at a global scale and is likely becoming a major public health problem for several years to come. It therefore is essential to start collecting data during the height of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. The overall purpose of this project within an international initiative is to gain an understanding of the different ways in which the Ugandan population has been affected relative to its African and non-African counterparts where responses to pandemic have differed. Furthermore, data from the time during the acute COVID-19 outbreak will be used beyond the acute phase of the pandemic by integrating data with two additional planned, independent survey waves at the end of 2021 and in 2022, taking place around 6 and 12 months after the WHO declares the COVID-19 pandemic to have ceased. Each survey will compare the actual status against the recalled status prior to the COVID-19 pandemic. The Ugandan COH-FIT project will recruit a representative sample of 2000 respondents in Uganda during each wave. Our data will shed crucial light on the impact of COVID-19 and its measures (lockdown, curfew, etc.) on different population strata and vulnerable subgroups. Our project aims to assess a randomly selected, nationally representative sample of individuals, which will allow us to conduct a broad range of analyses, within and across individuals living in the same household, within and across health care workers and non-health care workers, and in those with direct versus non-direct exposure to patients with COVID-19 infection and with COVID-19-related death. Data will be crucial not only for international organizations such as the World Health Organization but also for the Ugandan government. The project is led by Prof. Christoph U Correll, Charité University, Berlin, Germany, and Marco Solmi, Padua University, Italy, and developed together with more than 200 collaborators/ stakeholders among which the PI of this project is Dr. James Mugisha working collaboratively with Prof. Dr. Davy Vancampfort for the Ugandan site. Expected Outputs We will generate high-quality data on the mental and physical health effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and its measures, in order to promote the understanding of mechanisms relating to its epidemiology and inform interventions. Data will be published in high impact international journals, in local journals and in a policy report