The results of this study are without appeal. According to investigation conducted by a team from the Toulouse University Hospital, the confinement of spring 2020 impacted the cardiovascular and psychological health the French. Conducted by the Epidemiology Department and the Methodological Research Support Unit (USMR) of the Toulouse University Hospital and Inserm*, it concerns consequences of what was the very first confinement. The work was published in the scientific journal “International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health“.
Deterioration of the hygiene of life in the long term
Thereby, 65 % said they had reduced their physical activity, 27 % noted a weight gain of more than 2 kg and 61 % have adopted a lower quality food. the smoking has increased for 9 % of the people interviewed. If one might have thought this degradation of the hygiene of lifeand particularly of the diet foodtemporary and directly linked to confinement as such, “it is well remanent following a year“, specifies Professor Jean Ferrières, cardiologist at the origin of this study contacted by The Independent Opinion. “And it gets worse, he warns. Long-term monitoring is going to be paramount.”
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On the plan psychological, 35 % of participants showed signs of depression and 35 % signs anxiety. Symptoms which are essentially explained by “the lack of prospects and theuncertainty permanent, even following confinement, causing difficulties in projecting oneself”, explains Professor Jean Ferrières.
People in rural areas more affected by depression
Furthermore, this study reveals that people residing in rural areas during confinement were 1.7 times more affected by depression. “These people applied the confinement and the 1km ruleall the more frustrating for them who were surrounded by beautiful landscapes. Moreover, they were more adherent to containment because the health system is there less accessiblethey concerned from consequences if they caught the Covid-19not necessarily having hospitals in the direct vicinity”, details the cardiologist.
The women have also undergone confinement, with “3 times more depressions than men in a year. The women isolated have been cut off from the outside, those whose couples were not doing well sometimes faced ruptureswithout forgetting the mental load induced by household chores, children who had no no school…”, develops Professor Ferrières.
“The psychological state can weaken the immune defenses”
As much consequences potentially at risk for cardiovascular health of the French and who ask questions regarding the real profits of this strict containment on the Covid-19 epidemic.
“It’s a real fundamental question. In medicine we know that the psychological state can weaken the immune defenses once morest diseases and infections. It has never been proven but that is what we see in consultations. In cardiology, for example, there is Takotsubo disease, a heart attack caused by emotional shocks such as a breakup or death. Intellectual and moral impairment plays an undeniable role on physical health,” says the Toulouse professor.
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As for knowing how the public authorities can act to take charge of the health of the French, Professor Ferrières is formal: “First of all, we will have to fix the links between people. There are like two camps, two worlds to be reconciled between vaccinatednot vaccinated, pro-pass and anti-pass… And then as doctors we are going to have to start over in the relationship with our patients. They no longer believe in the medical word”, he regrets. A long-term work which should unfortunately continue beyond the pandemic…
*Study conducted on a representative group of Haute-Garonne of 534 people aged 50 to 89, questioned on the psychological and physiological level 1, 6 and 12 months following confinement.
