Level of awareness, knowledge and perception on COVID-19 among pregnant women attending antenatal clinics in Central Hospital Benin City, Edo state

Abstract

Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) is an infectious viral disease caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2, which affects mainly the respiratory system and was first discovered during an outbreak in Wuhan community in China December 2019. The outbreak was declared a pandemic by World Health Organization (WHO) March, 11th 2020 and a worldwide public health response has been engaged to address the impact. A descriptive cross sectional survey was utilized. A self- administered questionnaire on awareness, knowledge and perception of COVID-19 infection was administered to a total 420 pregnant women attending antenatal clinic in central Hospital Benin City for Data collection. Four hundred and fourteen (98.6%) of the respondents were aware of COVID-19 and 274 (66.2%) indicated television as their source of information. One hundred (24.2%) indicated radio while 92 (22.2%) implicated friends. One hundred and ninety seven (46.9%) of the respondents had good knowledge of COVID-19 while 68 (16.2%) had poor knowledge. There was a high level of awareness of COVID-19 among the pregnant women attending Antenatal clinic in central hospital Benin City and majority of them got their information from the television.