Resumen
Background: There remains uncertainty about Covid-19 risk factors. We examined UK adults’ risk perceptions for severe Covid-19 symptoms and whether engaging in concurrent health behaviours is associated with risk perceptions. Methods: Cross-sectional analysis of data from the HEBECO study where 2206 UK adults classified potential factors (age 70+, ethnic minority, medical comorbidities, vaping, smoking cigarettes, alcohol drinking, regular physical activity, being overweight, eating unhealthy foods, using nicotine replacement therapy – NRT, lower income, poor housing, being a keyworker) as either increasing, decreasing, or having no impact on severe Covid-19 symptoms. Logistic regressions examined whether engaging in health behaviours was associated with risk perceptions after adjusting for socio-demographic characteristics, health conditions and other behaviours. Results: The great majority (89-99%) of adults classified age 70+, having comorbidities, being a key worker, overweight, and from an ethnic minority as increasing the risk. People were less sure about alcohol drinking, vaping, and nicotine replacement therapy use (17.4-29.5% responding ‘don’t know’). Relative to those who did not, those who smoked tobacco, vaped and consumed alcohol had significantly (all p<0.015) higher odds (aORs=1.58 to 5.80) for classifying these behaviours as ‘no impact’ or ‘decreasing risk’, and lower odds (aORs=.25 to .72) for classifying as ‘increasing risk’. Similarly, eating more fruit and vegetables was associated with classifying unhealthy diet as ‘increasing risk’ (aOR=1.37,1.12-1.69), and exercising more with classifying regular physical activity as ‘decreasing risk’ (aOR=2.42,1.75-3.34). Conclusions: Risk perceptions for severe Covid-19 symptoms were lower for adults’ own health behaviours, evidencing optimism bias. Implications: These risk perceptions may form barriers to changing one’s own unhealthy behaviours or make one less responsive to interventions that refer to the risk of Covid-19 as a motivating factor. Thus, in some cases risk perceptions could help sustain unhealthy behaviours and exacerbate inequalities in health behaviours and outcomes.
Cómo citar (APA 7)
Herbec, A., Brown, J., Jackson, S., Kale, D., Zatonśki, M., Garnett, C., Chadborn, T., & Shahab, L. (2020). Perceived risk factors for severe Covid-19 symptoms and their association with health behaviours: Findings from the HEBECO study. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/xj5z7
