COVID-19 is disproportionately affecting women with major depressive disorder, says GlobalData

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is likely to have far-reaching consequences for the mental health of women with major depressive disorder (MDD), which is expected to increase in prevalence after the pandemic, says GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company.

Ana Fernandez Menjivar, MSc DLSHTM, Senior Epidemiologist at GlobalData, comments: “The higher prevalence of MDD in women compared to men is likely because women are more likely to be exposed to stressors and risk factors, such as work overload and pandemic-related job loss, which exacerbate the condition.”

MDD is a common mental health disorder that affects more than 264 million people globally. MDD 12-month prevalence is twice as high in women, at 10.5%, than that in men, at 5.5%, in the eight major markets.

Menjivar continues, “Globally, women have suffered the majority of pandemic-related economic and job losses. In the US, the National Women’s Law Center reported that women account for 53.8% of overall net job loss since the start of the pandemic. Similar trends have been reported in Italy, Spain, and the UK.”

Due to the pandemic, women have been more likely to exit the workforce due to childcare demands, as women are also spending more time caring for children in addition to their usual work demands. This increases the risk of MDD in women since individuals with lower social resources, lower economic resources, and greater exposure to stressors have reported a greater burden of MDD symptoms during the pandemic.

Menjivar concludes, “While MDD symptoms are not the same as the clinical disease of MDD, further research is necessary to understand if MDD will become one of many long-lasting effects of the current pandemic.”

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