Factors Related to Health Literacy on Prevention and Control of COVID-19: A Cross-sectional Study

COVID-19 has been recognized as one of the important public health issues and affected many regions of the world. Assessment and improving health literacy regarding this pandemic disease may contribute to control its spread. So, the current study designed with an objective to measure health literacy in a sample of general population and identify the likely associated factors.

Using a cross-sectional study a number of 590 Iranian people included in a convenient sample who were users of nationally authorized social virtual networks were assessed.    A demographic questionnaire as well as Health Literacy Scale on Prevention and Control of COVID-19 (51 items) were used to collect data. Student t test and one way analysis of variance using SPSS software version 24 were administered for data analysis.

The mean score of health literacy was 3.49 from 4 with SD=0.28. Measuring health literacy in the sample showed despite a relatively acceptable score in all domains, the score was higher in behavior domain. However, the scores in communication and analysis domains were lower than other dimensions. Also, based on findings factors such as age, gender, education level, academic major, and economic status were associated significantly (p<0.05) with health literacy.

Findings revealed that to improve health literacy of community on prevention of the disease further planning and educational interventions for theoretical domains of communication and analysis may be required. Also it is suggested any measurements or attempts toward health literacy promotion of Iranian population would be considered based on factors such as age, sex, academic major and economic status that may be associated with this concept.