Background
During the COVID-19 pandemic general medical complications have received the most attention, whereas only few studies address the potential direct effect on mental health of SARS-CoV-2 and the neurotropic potential. Furthermore, the indirect effects of the pandemic on general mental health are of increasing concern, particularly since the SARS-CoV-1 epidemic (2002–2003) was associated with psychiatric complications.

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COVID-19 pandemic and mental health consequences: Systematic review of the current evidence.

How mental health care should change as a consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Background



The effects of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) on the population's mental health and well-being are likely to be profound and long lasting.

Aims



To investigate the trajectory of mental health and well-being during the first 6 weeks of lockdown in adults in the UK.

Method



A quota survey design and a sampling frame that permitted recruitment of a national sample was employed. Findings for waves 1 (31 March to 9 April 2020), 2 (10 April to 27 April 2020) and 3 (28 April to 11 May 2020) are reported here. A range of mental health factors was assessed: pre-existing mental health problems, suicide attempts and self-harm, suicidal ideation, depression, anxiety, defeat, entrapment, mental well-being and loneliness.

Results



A total of 3077 adults in the UK completed the survey at wave 1. Suicidal ideation increased over time. Symptoms of anxiety, and levels of defeat and entrapment decreased across waves whereas levels of depressive symptoms did not change significantly. Positive well-being also increased. Levels of loneliness did not change significantly over waves. Subgroup analyses showed that women, young people (18–29 years), those from more socially disadvantaged backgrounds and those with pre-existing mental health problems have worse mental health outcomes during the pandemic across most factors.

Conclusions



The mental health and well-being of the UK adult population appears to have been affected in the initial phase of the COVID-19 pandemic. The increasing rates of suicidal thoughts across waves, especially among young adults, are concerning.

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Mental health and well-being during the COVID-19 pandemic: longitudinal analyses of adults in the UK COVID-19 Mental Health & Wellbeing study.

The Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has deeply altered social and working environments in several ways. Social distancing policies, mandatory lockdowns, isolation periods, and anxiety of getting sick, along with the suspension of productive activity, loss of income, and fear of the future, jointly influence the mental health of citizens and workers. Workplace aspects can play a crucial role on moderating or worsening mental health of people facing this pandemic scenario. The purpose of this literature review is to deepen the psychological aspects linked to workplace factors, following the epidemic rise of COVID-19, in order to address upcoming psychological critical issues in the workplaces. We performed a literature search using Google Scholar, PubMed, and Scopus, selecting papers focusing on workers' psychological problems that can be related to the workplace during the pandemic. Thirty-five articles were included. Mental issues related to the health emergency, such as anxiety, depression, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and sleep disorders are more likely to affect healthcare workers, especially those on the frontline, migrant workers, and workers in contact with the public. Job insecurity, long periods of isolation, and uncertainty of the future worsen the psychological condition, especially in younger people and in those with a higher educational background. Multiple organizational and work-related interventions can mitigate this scenario, such as the improvement of workplace infrastructures, the adoption of correct and shared anti-contagion measures, including regular personal protective equipment (PPE) supply, and the implementation of resilience training programs. This review sets the basis for a better understanding of the psychological conditions of workers during the pandemic, integrating individual and social perspectives, and providing insight into possible individual, social, and occupational approaches to this "psychological pandemic".

COVID-19-Related Mental Health Effects in the Workplace: A Narrative Review.

This review was done to synthesize the existing evidence on the prevalence of various psychological morbidities among general public, healthcare workers and COVID-19 patients amidst this pandemic situation. Systematic searches were conducted in various databases and search engines such as Medline, Chinese national knowledge infrastructure, Cochrane library, ScienceDirect, and Google Scholar from inception until 22 April 2020. Newcastle Ottawa scale was used to assess the quality of included studies. We carried out a meta-analysis with random-effects model and reported pooled prevalence with 95% confidence intervals (CIs).A total of 50 studies were included in the review. Only seven studies (14%) had low risk of bias. Pooled prevalence rate of psychological morbidities includes poor sleep quality (40%), stress (34%), psychological distress (34%), insomnia (30%), post-traumatic stress symptoms (27%), anxiety (26%), depression (26%). Pooled prevalence rate of psychological morbidities with respect to impact of event due to COVID-19 pandemic was 44% (95%CI-42% to 47%). The burden of these psychological morbidities was highest among the COVID-19 patients followed by healthcare workers and general population.

Prevalence of psychological morbidities among general population, healthcare workers and COVID-19 patients amidst the COVID-19 pandemic: A systematic review and meta-analysis.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has declared that the Corona Virus (COVID-19) has become a global pandemic. This study aimed to investigate the psychological symptoms of ordinary Chinese citizens during the Level I Emergency Response throughout China. From January 31 to February 2 2020, an online questionnaire, Symptom Checklist 90 (SCL-90) was designed, and differences in GSI T-scores among subgroups were examined by ANOVA. Based on a cut-off point of the GSI T-scores of 63, the overall sample was divided into high and low-risk groups. of the 1,060 participants investigated in China, more than 70% of them have moderate and higher level of psychological symptoms specifically elevated scores for obsessive compulsion, interpersonal sensitivity, phobic anxiety, and psychoticism. There were no significant differences between males and females. Those who were of over 50 years old, had an undergraduate education and below, were divorced or widowed, and agricultural workers had significantly more symptoms. However, significantly more minors and medical staff were in the high-risk group. These results show that COVID-19 has a significant adverse socio-psychological influence on ordinary citizens. Therefore, governments should equip psychological health departments and pay attention to the people who are in high-risk groups, providing psychological interventions and assistance.

Psychological symptoms of ordinary Chinese citizens based on SCL-90 during the level I emergency response to COVID-19.

According to the International Labor Organization (2017), the lack of awareness of safety management leads to 3,000 deaths every day, two every minute, and caused economic losses of 4 percent of global GDP. Also, according to the ILO, 600,000 lives would be saved every year if the available safety management system was used. Therefore, it is necessary to strengthen the audit of safety management and evaluate the risks in the process, which will be conducive to the design of effective safety management methods and reduce the frequency of accidents. Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to an Ideal Solution (TOPSIS) is a common method for audit risk assessment, but in practice, evaluation results obtained using this method are ambiguous as the method relies on individual judgment. Thus, we used the interval-valued intuitionistic fuzzy uncertain language to improve the classical TOPSIS. In this paper, the safety management audit risk evaluation model is structured based on the modern audit risk model from International Auditing and Assurance Standards Board (IAASB). The improved TOPSIS is applied to assess the safety management audit risk from a general perspective. A company is used as the research object to verify safety management audit risk and ranking results of this study. Our empirical results are expected to help companies build future safety management strategies, ensure the safety of the production process, and also realize the sustainable development.

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Risk Assessment of Safety Management Audit Based on Fuzzy TOPSIS Method

Background: To effectively avoid accidents caused by practitioners’ unsafe state in the process of coal mine production processes, it is necessary to clarify the factors influencing the practitioners’ unsafe state, and take corresponding control measures accordingly. Methods: With the help of literature research and on-site interviews, grounded theory was used to construct the influencing factor index system of the coal mine practitioners’ unsafe state. The index system primary includes indices of four core categories, physiology, psychology, organization, and technology, and secondary indices of fourteen main categories. An AHP-DEMATEL model was constructed to calculate the comprehensive degree of influence of each influencing factor and rank it. Results: The results show that the main factors affecting the coal mine practitioners’ unsafe state are physical quality, degree of fatigue, safety attitude, safety awareness, safety culture, and vigilance. Physical quality and degree of fatigue are the key factors that affect the coal mine practitioners’ unsafe state, which is more consistent with the actual situation of coal mine practitioners. With the findings of this study, coal mine managers can take relevant countermeasures to intervene in coal mine practitioners’ unsafe state and reduce the occurrence of accidents.

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Application of AHP and DEMATEL for Identifying Factors Influencing Coal Mine Practitioners’ Unsafe State

(1) Background: As a world-recognized high-risk occupation, coal mine workers need various cognitive functions to process the surrounding information to cope with a large number of perceived hazards or risks. Therefore, it is necessary to explore the connection between coal mine workers’ neural activity and unsafe behavior from the perspective of cognitive neuroscience. This study explored the functional brain connectivity of coal mine workers who have engaged in unsafe behaviors (EUB) and those who have not (NUB). (2) Methods: Based on functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS), a total of 106 workers from the Hongliulin coal mine of Shaanxi North Mining Group, one of the largest modern coal mines in China, completed the test. Pearson’s Correlation Coefficient (COR) analysis, brain network analysis, and two-sample t-test were used to investigate the difference in brain functional connectivity between the two groups. (3) Results: The results showed that there were significant differences in functional brain connectivity between EUB and NUB among the frontopolar area (p = 0.002325), orbitofrontal area (p = 0.02102), and pars triangularis Broca’s area (p = 0.02888). Small-world properties existed in the brain networks of both groups, and the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex had significant differences in clustering coefficient (p = 0.0004), nodal efficiency (p = 0.0384), and nodal local efficiency (p = 0.0004). (4) Conclusions: This study is the first application of fNIRS to the field of coal mine safety. The fNIRS brain functional connectivity analysis is a feasible method to investigate the neuropsychological mechanism of unsafe behavior in coal mine workers in the view of brain science.

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Is There a Difference in Brain Functional Connectivity between Chinese Coal Mine Workers Who Have Engaged in Unsafe Behavior and Those Who Have Not?

Abstract Miners’ unsafe behavior is the main cause of accidents in coal mines, and unsafe state have an important influence on unsafe behavior among miners. To minimize accidents from the source of accident chain, we evaluated the impact of workload on miners’ unsafe state. It is important for coal enterprises to monitor miners’ unsafe state and to prevent unsafe accidents. Workload is divided into two dimensions: work time and work demand. Meanwhile, we introduced job satisfaction as a moderating variable. Through empirical research methods, first-line employees from two coal mines in China were enrolled in the questionnaire survey. Regression analysis was used to verify the impact of workload and its various dimensions, job satisfaction, and miners’ unsafe state. We found that workload, work time and work demand have significant positive effects on miners’ unsafe state. Job satisfaction plays a moderating effect in the relationship between workload and miners’ unsafe state. To some extent, a higher job satisfaction was associated with reduced workload, reduced occurrence of miners’ unsafe state and minimal incidences of unsafe accidents. On this basis, measures were proposed to improve miners’ unsafe state in terms of workload and job satisfaction. This study informs the establishment of effective intervention measures to monitor miners’ unsafe state and is also beneficial to the improvement of coal mine safety. 

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Shuicheng Tian

Papers

Psychological symptoms of ordinary Chinese citizens based on SCL-90 during the level I emergency response to COVID-19.

Risk Assessment of Safety Management Audit Based on Fuzzy TOPSIS Method

Application of AHP and DEMATEL for Identifying Factors Influencing Coal Mine Practitioners’ Unsafe State

Is There a Difference in Brain Functional Connectivity between Chinese Coal Mine Workers Who Have Engaged in Unsafe Behavior and Those Who Have Not?

The effect of job satisfaction regulating workload on miners’ unsafe state