Throughout history, humanity has encountered various epidemics and pandemics. SARS, MERS, swine flu and Ebola are all diseases that countries have struggled with in the last 20 years. In December 2019, SARS-CoV-2 emerged and quickly spread into a global pandemic. Countries were forced to take a number of measures, which varied greatly from country to country. Countries such as Italy, Germany and Slovenia have not experienced outbreaks of epidemics in recent years. Therefore, there were differences in the performance of coping with the epidemic. In the introductory part, we checked the history of epidemics, where they appeared and what their consequences were. We also touched on what measures certain countries took at the beginning of the new epidemic.
An epidemic was declared in Slovenia from 18.10.2020 to 15.6.2021. During this time, many measures were taken by the state. Since Slovenia had no experience with any of the epidemics for a long time, we were interested in how the safety culture from the work environment can influence behavior in our private lives. We wanted to check how people take certain measures in different locations in the role of an employee and how in the role of a user or visitor. Someone who represents added value to society will be able to transfer behavioral patterns learned in professional life to private life as well. Therefore, before starting the work, we formulated 8 different assumptions, which we checked in the experimental work.
To collect data, we used the observation method and checked compliance with the measures of 16,253 people. We checked whether people are using the measures set by the state (keeping a distance, disinfecting hands, wearing a mask correctly). The observation was carried out in eight different locations for 1 hour each: a market, a shopping center, a hypermarket, a hospital lobby, a sports and recreation facility, a waiting room at a train station, a courtyard in front of a high school, and a gas station. The observed intervals were one hour each time at each location. We carried out the observation from 8/5/2021 to 5/7/2021, i.e. during the epidemic and when it was gone.
In the work, we noticed that there are differences in compliance with the measures according to gender, depending on the status of the observer (employee/user), and differences occur both in different and in the same kind of environments. The observed person's age does not affect compliance with the measures, as the differences in compliance with the measures are minimal. We also found that compliance with the measures in Slovenia depends on the epidemiological situation in the country. During the declared epidemic, people adhered to the measures more than when there was no epidemic and the measures were given as recommendations. The epidemic of the coronavirus disease should be a lesson for us in how to behave correctly in the event of possible subsequent epidemics.
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