Health of Pregnant Women and New Mothers during COVID-19 in India

Description

Page: 210-215

Ritu Singh and Niharika Bisht (Department of Human Development & Family Studies, GBPUA&T, Pantnagar, Uttarakhand)

Giving birth is one of the most pleasurable and awaited moment of a woman’s life. This phase is often accompanied by various changes both at individual and interpersonal level. The entire pre and post-pregnancy journey entails a lot of challenges making women emotionally vulnerable. The onset of COVID-19 has further made these challenges even more complicated. The present study was designed to assess the overall health of expecting and new mothers amid COVID-19. The study consisted of a total of 524 women including 209 pregnant women and 315 new mothers selected through purposive and snowball sampling techniques from four private hospitals from Udham Singh Nagar District of Uttarakhand and Gautam Buddha Nagar district of Uttar Pradesh. Self-structured questionnaires were used for data collection. The results revealed that majority of the respondents reported to have good family and financial health but poor social and emotional health. The physical and cognitive aspect of health was reported to be moderate.