The COVID-19 pandemic has had major social and economic impacts. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), mental health has been widely affected. “Plenty of us became more anxious; but for some COVID-19 has sparked or amplified much more serious mental health problems,” said WHO. “A great number of people have reported psychological distress and symptoms of depression, anxiety or post-traumatic stress.”
Recently, the BBC reported on a study that said the damage to people’s mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic was “minimal.” Of course, people took to Twitter to share their true thoughts on the study BBC reported.
The study was done by Canadian researchers from institutions including the McGill, Ottawa, and Toronto universities, and published on March 8 in The BMJ. A peer-reviewed medical journal. This study found that “changes in general mental health, anxiety symptoms, and depression symptoms,” due to the pandemic have been “minimal to small.”
Twitter reacts to “damage to people’s mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic was ‘minimal.'”
After the BBC shared its report on the study on Twitter, their account was flooded with responses from people who disagreed with the study’s conclusion. A lot of the tweets had examples of what people did during the pandemic that would debunk the study. It was noted along with the tweet that the review “was lacking in data for many vulnerable groups, and that the findings in it can’t necessarily be applied to everyone.” The tweet has more than 122.6 million views and over 47.8 thousand quote responses.
One user quoted the tweet saying, “i stayed up for 40 hours straight bc i thought 1d was getting back together on july 23rd 2020.” Another Twitter user said that they “had a birthday party for the dishwasher.” Their tweet showed her and a child sitting in front of the kitchen appliance while holding a birthday cake with a zero candle.
See how Twitter reacted to BBC News’ recent study below.