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Healthcare Impact
The following information will provide clarity on some of the main effects the COVID-19 pandemic has had on healthcare workers and healthcare in general. From the people with high chances of contracting a severe case of COVID-19, to the people on the frontlines, treating the patients, who have already contracted the widespread illness.

Since the COVID-19 pandemic set in, people of all ages have been put at risk for contracting the potentially deadly disease. In an Interview survey about the vulnerability for young adults contracting a severe case of COVID-19, the results proved that people of all ages, who have certain medical conditions, were equally at risk for contracting the disease. For example, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention provided significant information data showing how smokers were more at risk for contracting COVID-19 than nonsmokers, at any age (Adams 2020).

Not only is the healthcare system noticing risk factors for potential patients, but the healthcare workers are suffering from a long list of conditions due to the high pressure situation they have been put under to treat all the individuals with the COVID-19 virus. One specific study on nurses from the American Journal of Infection Control was held to discover what it was like for the nurses treating people with COVID-19. Results from the surveys within the study showed that nurses were feeling lots of pressure and anxiety throughout the onset and continuation of the pandemic. There were also many coping mechanisms that were recorded as forms of psychological defense. For example some coping mechanisms included isolation, distractions, and humor (Sun 2020). Along with the outcomes of this study, a study from Lancet Global Health also studied the same impacts on nurses and include physicians as well. Mostly the same information was found, but some other conditions were added like, depression and insomnia. The researchers collected the information straight from the healthcare workers just like the prior study. So, it is safe to say the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic is having a stressful effect on the healthcare workers (Qian Liu 2020).

Along with nurses and physicians, other healthcare workers were studied as well, like psychiatrists. One study in particular by the journal of Psychiatric Services, studied how the COVID-19 pandemic forced psychiatry into “telemedicine,” which is a form of treatment that takes place through the use of technology instead of in person interviews. The results showed that although the telemedicine was forced upon the psychiatrists and their patients, the therapy sessions proceeded to go rather well with only a few barriers. Some of the barriers found in the study included the inability to read non-verbal cues from one another and some loss of the effectiveness of the treatments overall, but the study also said that telemedicine may be kept in mind for the future after the pandemic too. So, the negative impact of the pandemic may also have had some innovative inspiration for psychiatry (Uscher-Pines 2020).