Covid playing games with the mind

For Rajendra Minz, the sub-divisional magistrate of Bhanjanagar in Ganjam district, who was found Covid positive and has fully recovered now, little has changed. “The symptoms were similar to that of viral fever. I knew I would be infected someday as I was receiving migrant workers who were returning to the district since the beginning,” said Minz, who did not let Covid disturb his strong mental make-up.
Unlike Minz, for Bhubaneswar resident Himanshu (45), who showed mild symptoms in mid-August and was in home isolation for five days, there is not a moment of peace.He makes 10 calls a day to his psychiatrist even now and is on medication for anxiety. “Being in home quarantine with nothing to do the whole day and all kinds of negative news related to Covid coming from everywhere, I felt utterly confused and lost. This only added to my anxiety,” he said.
The virus has spared none, neither the living nor the dead. With cremations not being performed and rituals for the dead not being followed under the current circumstances, many families are yet to come to terms with the departed soul not getting a proper closure.
Dr Amrit Pattojoshi, chief coordinator of Indian Psychiatry Society-WHO-Unicef, an initiative to provide psychiatric telemedicine facility during Covid-19, said, “Families are scared to cremate the dead. They expect the doctors to do the cremation as well. Doctors are overburdened. They have been arranging everything – from ambulances, hospital beds, oxygen cylinders to even cremations. Every other doctor is infected. They have been doing their best for the patients, but it is taking a toll on them. They too need care.”
He added that among the cases he has seen so far, elderly couples are the worst-hit, both mentally and physically. “If one gets infected, the other feels helpless and purposeless. The youngsters feel that nothing is going to happen to them, but what they don’t realise is that they may be bringing the virus home owing to their recklessness,” Pattojoshi warned. “Surprisingly, children have shown maturity in accepting and adapting to the situation,” he said.
Explaining the games that Covid is playing with the mind, Professor Namita Mohanty, former head of department (psychology), Utkal University, said people are reacting to it in different ways. “Many elderly couples are preparing their wills, disclosing all information about their movable and immovable assets to their children. Uncertain of their own future, they are trying to secure the future of their children. The youngsters, on the other hand, feel that they are largely immune from the virus and have no qualms about breaking the Covid rules. They suffer from what is now being called an ‘optimism bias’. Given that most youngsters do not have co-morbidities, they are taking things lightly,” Mohanty, who was also a member of the Odisha Public Service Commission, added.
Being Covid-positive almost sounds like a shield now. With every alternate household having at least one infected patient, who has also recovered from the disease, is the battle over? What about the ones who have not been infected so far?
Prem Chand Chaudhary, the commissioner of Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation, said, “With chances of re-infection less likely in cured patients who showed no or mild symptoms, the battle is half won. Since such patients develop antibodies, there is lesser chance of a repeat infection. Hence, they are more confident of life than the ones who have not been infected yet.”
Though he did not rule out the possibility of a second and more severe wave of infection, he added that Odisha has not reported any case of Covid relapse so far.
“What Covid-19 has unleashed is the highest kind of psychological disorder. Mental health is dependent on the bio-pyschosocial well-being. But the virus, the lockdown to prevent that and the explosion of news related to Covid has dealt a blow to the bio-psychosocial make-up of people. At this juncture, it’s very important for them to ventilate their sorrows and share their joys. The lockdown had robbed them off this basic need. They must go out taking all the necessary precautions and meet their near and dear ones,” professor Sarada Prasanna Swain, director of Mental Health Institute at SCB Medical College and Hospital in Cuttack, said.