The effect of fatalism perception of pregnant women on taking precautions against the risk of virus transmission in the Covid-19 pandemic in Turkey

Abstract

Covid-19 pandemic has affected all over the world, particularly affecting risky groups and causing the deaths of millions of people. Owing to the systemic changes that occur during pregnancy, pregnant women are among the risk groups. In this study, we aimed to determine the effect of the fatalism tendency of the pregnant women on the precautions they take to protect themselves from the risk of virus transmission. We conducted this study as descriptive cross-sectional. We collected the data between February 11^th and March 24^th, 2021. The sample of this study comprised of 418 pregnant women. Fatalism tendency was high in the pregnant women with low education and income levels and housewives. It was determined that the pregnant women with a high tendency of fatalism wore less masks. The beliefs of individuals should not be ignored while creating health policies in the fight against the pandemic.

Acknowledgments

We thank all volunteer pregnant women who participated in the study.

Ethical standards disclosure

Ethics committee approval was obtained from the Human Research Ethics Committee of a state university (Number: E-57452775-604.01.01-6070).

Author contrubutions

Bahtışen Kartal, Derya Şahin, and Özlem Guner contributed to the design of the study. Bahtışen Kartal and Özlem Guner prepared the online questionnaire. Bahtışen Kartal, Derya Şahin, and Özlem Guner controlled the questionnaires that were included for this study. Özlem Guner analyzed and interpreted the data. Bahtışen Kartal and Derya Şahin drafted the manuscript. All authors reviewed the manuscript and have seen and approved the final version.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

The author(s) reported there is no funding associated with the work featured in this article.