Vaccination against SARS-CoV-2 and its relationship with public interest in mental health: a study between 2020-2022 in Spain

ABSTRACT

The possible relationship between vaccination against SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19) and mental health has been largely unexplored. We investigated variations in public interest in mental health issues between the different periods of the vaccination campaign against SARS-CoV-2 in Spain and before the initiation of the campaign. Using Google Trends, we explored the relative search volume (RSV) for the terms ‘anxiety’, ‘depression’, ‘stress’, ‘insomnia’, and ‘suicide’ between 03/01/2020 and 01/15/2022. The RSV was compared for these terms with respect to four periods: the pre-vaccination pandemic period; the period running from initiation of vaccination until 50% of the population was fully vaccinated (FV); the period running from 50% FV to 70% FV; and the period after 70% FV. Differences in the RSV indices were observed between the studied periods for ‘anxiety’(F = 6.07; p = 0.001; ƞ² = 0.16), ‘stress’ (F = 7.77; p < 0.001; ƞ² = 0.19), and ‘insomnia’ (F = 3.80; p = 0.013; ƞ² = 0.11). A lower RSV was found for ‘anxiety’, ‘stress’, and ‘insomnia’ after 70% FV compared to the two previous vaccination periods. A lower RSV was also found for ‘stress’ after achieving the milestone of 70% FV in relation to the period prior to initiation of the campaign. In conclusion, there is less need for information on specific mental health topics in the period after 70% FV. In Spain, reaching this vaccination milestone may have had a positive impact on anxiety, stress, and insomnia levels in the population, as reflected in fewer web searches for information on these psychopathological processes. The promotion of the COVID-19 vaccination campaign could take into account the changes observed in this preliminary study with respect to public interest in stress, anxiety, and insomnia once a large percentage of the population has been vaccinated.

KEYWORDS:

• Sars-CoV-2
• COVID-19
• vaccine
• mental health
• public health
• internet use

Authors contributions

JAB-G wrote the first draft of the manuscript, collected data, conducted the statistical analyses, and submitted the final version. JAB-G, TS-G, AC, and SB contributed to the interpretation of the results, participated in the drafting of the manuscript, and approved the final version.

Data availability statement

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author, [JAB-G], upon reasonable request.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This study was partially funded by UNIR Research (http://research.unir.net), Universidad Internacional de La Rioja (UNIR, http://www.unir.net), under the Research Projects Strategy RETOS-UNIR (2018-2020, 2020-2022, 2022-2024), and by the Spanish Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness (MINECO, grant number: PSI2017-82542-R) and the Fundación Alicia Koplowitz (2020).