| dc.description.abstract | Uganda was one of the countries which implemented a national lockdown due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Although Uganda had not registered any case of COVOD-19 at that time they closed schools and transportation of people. Worldwide this pandemic had a huge impact on mental health of people in many countries with similar reactions in terms of emotions and fear at the population level. Our study investigated the impact of COVID-19 lockdown on the psychosocial well-being of BIOP final students at Makerere University. 132 Makerere university BIOP final students completed standardized questionnaires between July and August 2022. The questionnaire contained different sections of psychosocial well-being, academic performance and copying strategies the sample was detected using a simple random sampling. The data was analyzed using SPSS, A total of 132 participants were studied, of this 89 (67.4%) were female.106 (80.3%) were in the age group of 18-25 years. And 115(87.1%) were single taking the highest population in the study, 10(7.6%) were engaged and 3(2.3%) separated 3 (2.2%) divorced. One hundred fourteen (86.4%) were full time students, 11(8.3%) were part time employees and 7(5.3%) were full time employees. 52(39.34%) of the participants come from a family size of 2-4 members, 57 (43.2%) were from a family size of 5-8 members and 23(17.4 %) come from a family size of 9 and above. COVID-19 lockdown and psychological well-being r=.095, p=.281 where (p=.28>0.05) showing COVID-19 did not affect the mental health of BIOP students. COVID-19 lockdown relationship with academic performance r=.167, p=.056 and the relationship of psychosocial well-being and academic performance r=.181, p=.039. University students are at risk of psychosocial distress in the case of traumatic events such as stigmatization, resentment and ambiguity. The evolution of the pandemic is uncertain and may have long-term effects on mental health. Therefore, it is crucial to study the most effective interventions to identify vulnerable subgroups and to plan for acute and long-term psychological services to control and reduce the burden of psychological, health and social problems among the students. | en_US |
