Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2020 Dec 30;10(12):e046620.
doi: 10.1136/bmjopen-2020-046620.

Risk of COVID-19-related bullying, harassment and stigma among healthcare workers: an analytical cross-sectional global study

Timothy D Dye  1 , Lisette Alcantara  2 , Shazia Siddiqi  2 , Monica Barbosu  2 , Saloni Sharma  2 , Tiffany Panko  2 , Eva Pressman  2
Affiliations

Risk of COVID-19-related bullying, harassment and stigma among healthcare workers: an analytical cross-sectional global study

Timothy D Dye et al. BMJ Open. .

Abstract

Objectives: Essential healthcare workers (HCW) uniquely serve as both COVID-19 healers and, potentially, as carriers of SARS-CoV-2. We assessed COVID-19-related stigma and bullying against HCW controlling for social, psychological, medical and community variables.

Design: We nested an analytical cross-sectional study of COVID-19-related stigma and bullying among HCW within a larger mixed-methods effort assessing COVID-19-related lived experience and impact. Adjusted OR (aOR) and 95% CIs evaluated the association between working in healthcare settings and experience of COVID-19-related bullying and stigma, controlling for confounders. Thematic qualitative analysis provided insight into lived experience of COVID-19-related bullying.

Setting: We recruited potential participants in four languages (English, Spanish, French, Italian) through Amazon Mechanical Turk's online workforce and Facebook.

Participants: Our sample included 7411 people from 173 countries who were aged 18 years or over.

Findings: HCW significantly experienced more COVID-19-related bullying after controlling for the confounding effects of job-related, personal, geographic and sociocultural variables (aOR: 1.5; 95% CI 1.2 to 2.0). HCW more frequently believed that people gossip about others with COVID-19 (OR: 2.2; 95% CI 1.9 to 2.6) and that people with COVID-19 lose respect in the community (OR: 2.3; 95% CI 2.0 to 2.7), both which elevate bullying risk (OR: 2.7; 95% CI 2.3 to 3.2, and OR: 3.5; 95% CI 2.9 to 4.2, respectively). The lived experience of COVID-19-related bullying relates frequently to public identities as HCW traverse through the community, intersecting with other domains (eg, police, racism, violence).

Interpretation: After controlling for a range of confounding factors, HCW are significantly more likely to experience COVID-19-related stigma and bullying, often in the intersectional context of racism, violence and police involvement in community settings.

Keywords: COVID-19; epidemiology; public health.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

Competing interests: None declared.

References

    1. Link B, Hatzenbuehler ML. Stigma as an unrecognized determinant of population health: research and policy implications. J Health Polit Policy Law 2016;41:653–73. 10.1215/03616878-3620869 - DOI - PubMed
    1. Link BG, Phelan JC. Conceptualizing stigma. Annu Rev Sociol 2001;27:363–85. 10.1146/annurev.soc.27.1.363 - DOI
    1. Kwaghe AV, Ilesanmi OS, Amede PO. Stigmatization, psychological and emotional trauma among frontline health care workers treated for COVID-19 in Lagos state, Nigeria: a qualitative study. 2020. https://www.researchsquare.com/article/rs-53453/v1. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Sauer KS, Jungmann SM, Witthöft M. Emotional and Behavioral Consequences of the COVID-19 Pandemic: The Role of Health Anxiety, Intolerance of Uncertainty, and Distress (In)Tolerance. Int J Environ Res Public Health 2020;17:7241. 10.3390/ijerph17197241 - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. United Nations Security Council . Resolution 2286. 12 Dec 2016.

Publication types

MeSH terms