• Abid Hasan Khan, Mst Sadia Sultana, Sahadat Hossain, M Tasdik Hasan, Helal Uddin Ahmed, and Md Tajuddin Sikder.
• Department of Public Health and Informatics, Jahangirnagar University, Savar, Dhaka, Bangladesh.
• J Affect Disord. 2020 Dec 1; 277: 121-128.

BackgroundCOVID-19 is imposing threat both on physical and mental health since its outbreak. Bangladesh adopted lockdown strategy with potential consequences on day to day life, mental and physical health and this study aims to explore the impact of COVID-19 on mental health and wellbeing among Bangladeshi students.MethodsA cross-sectional study was conducted between 9th and 23rd April 2020 among 505 college and university students. Data was collected by using online questionnaire including DASS 21 and IES. Descriptive analysis and bivariate linear regression were performed to examine the association of variables.Results28.5 % of the respondents had stress, 33.3% anxiety, 46.92% depression from mild to extremely severe, according to DASS 21 and 69.31% had event-specific distress from mild to severe in terms of severity according to IES. Perceiving physical symptoms as COVID-19 was significantly associated with DASS stress subscale (B = 3.71, 95% CI: 1.01 to 6.40), DASS anxiety subscale (B = 3.95, 95% CI: 1.95 to 5.96), DASS depression subscale (B = 3.82, 95% CI: 0.97 to 6.67) and IES scale (B = 7.52, 95% CI: 3.58 to 11.45). Additionally, fear of infection, financial uncertainty, inadequate food supply, absence of physical exercise and limited or no recreational activity had significant association with stress, anxiety, depression and post-traumatic symptoms.ConclusionThis COVID-19 outbreak imposes psychological consequences on people to a great extent which requires attention from the concerned authorities to cope with this situation mentally. The perception about the outbreak can also play a big role in psychological impact.Copyright © 2020 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

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