Responding to COVID-19 and preparing for the future: Understanding the experiences and needs of specific population groups during home-isolation/quarantine for COVID-19 to inform current and future pandemic responses. Novel respiratory virus outbreaks such as COVID-19 pose a significant threat to public health due to their ability to spread rapidly among populations with little prior immunity.
In an attempt to contain and slow the spread of infectious disease outbreaks such as COVID- 19, asking members of the general public to undertake isolation or quarantine in their homes can become a key public health protection measure.
Isolation is for when a person has symptoms or a positive diagnosis of COVID-19. Quarantine is for when a person is well but may have been in contact with someone with COVID-19.
Research was conducted via qualitative phone interviews in March and April 2020 to understand the experiences of people who were participating in or had completed community-based isolation/quarantine in Australia related to COVID-19.
Another phase of this research was expanded to include investigation into the experiences that specific population groups were having during home-isolation/quarantine.
The research study looked to interview people who were 18 years and older, and had been instructed to undertake isolation or quarantine at home by a public health authority for one of the following reasons:
They had to identify as one or more of the following: