The impact of the coronavirus pandemic on cases of agoraphobia

The SARS-CoV-2 virus pandemic has plunged the world into a very deep social, economic and health crisis for months and it is clear that it has been a very complex phenomenon to analyze. That is why, sometimes, it falls into simplism even when we limit ourselves to assessing the impact it has had on people's health.

And it is that, in many cases, we only take into account the medical problems associated with COVID-19, and we overlook that the pandemic does not need us to come into direct contact with the virus to harm us. To do this, it uses an element with a great capacity to affect our mental health: fear.

Fear can take many forms, and most of them do not constitute a mental disorder; but in exceptional situations, everything around us conspires to make what began as a fear that we initially assumed to be something normal becomes a true vicious circle of anticipatory anxiety, avoidance behaviors of imaginary dangers and other dynamics harmful This is what it has happened on more than one occasion with agoraphobia facilitated by the context of the pandemic.

• Related article: "Types of Anxiety Disorders and their characteristics"

Characteristics of agoraphobia

Agoraphobia is, above all, a psychological disorder that is part of anxiety disorders, a category in which mental disorders based on a way dysfunctional way of managing our thoughts and emotions when something or someone makes us feel anxious (and, as a result, makes us feel that way very frequency).

Specifically, people who develop agoraphobia are very predisposed to suffer intense anxiety attacks before situations in which they perceive that it would be difficult to flee from a danger if it appeared and/or in which they could not have help in case something bad happens to them (such as suffering their own “peak” of anxiety). For this reason, someone with agoraphobia adopts a series of behavior patterns based on the avoidance of those "threatening" places, which at Contrary to what is usually thought, they can be both open places (a wide and busy street) or closed places (an elevator): what What is important is the degree to which the person perceives that in that place they are protected or can have the support of someone involved in their welfare.

Some of the characteristic symptoms of agoraphobia (which do not have to occur all at once in the person) are:

• Fear of leaving home.
• Avoidance of very open spaces or where we are very exposed, such as bridges, squares, car parks...
• Avoidance of very closed places, such as elevators, galleries, alleys, passages under train tracks...
• Experiencing a sudden rise in anxiety levels when feeling unprotected (although we cannot locate a real specific threat).
• Tendency to suffer a lot of anticipatory anxiety at the very idea of ​​suffering a “peak” of anxiety.
• The above symptoms last for months.

In this way, agoraphobia is a disorder that, without the person realizing it, throws her into a vicious cycle of fear and avoidance: little by little the idea arises that you do not have control over the way in which these strong states are activated of anxiety, and this makes these manifest more easily and normally with increasing frequency. And in turn, the desire to avoid problems by exposing yourself to places where there is no protection or help available makes agoraphobia win. leading role in the person's life, which makes them self-suggest (involuntarily) and become more vulnerable to anxiety.

And what does this have to do with the coronavirus pandemic? Let's see it below.

• You may be interested: "Agoraphobia: what it is, causes, symptoms and treatment"

What do we know about the anxiety problems triggered by the coronavirus?

A report published at the end of 2021 by the European Commission and the OECD shows some revealing data about the relationship between the pandemic and psychological disorders linked to anxiety:

• Already in the first months of the pandemic on a global scale, cases of anxiety disorders and/or depression became approximately double what was seen in previous years.
• The tendency to suffer from anxiety with or without depressive-type symptoms has risen and fallen, corresponding to the number of infections and the harshness of the health measures taken by governments.
• The psychological impact of the pandemic has been markedly uneven, based on economic and biological differences.

On the other hand, research carried out on the psychological consequences that COVID-19 has left behind in many cases shows that those who have suffered cases with significant symptoms are statistically more likely to suffer from anxiety disorders (around 15% of people developed at least one in the weeks after manifesting the disease), among which is agoraphobia.

Thus, the coronavirus pandemic has not affected the entire population equally, nor in terms of the risk of develop a serious case of COVID-19, nor in terms of the impact that the crisis has had on the mental health of the people. Thus, those who during these months were in a precarious economic situation or did not have a job have reported suffering more problems of anxiety, and the feeling of anguish has also been greater in those who did not enjoy good health or were a population at risk due to their age. But interestingly, young people have also been the target of increased problems with anxiety and depression, probably due to the disruption of their habits and, also, possibly due to their greater vulnerability due to precariousness labor.

It is also worth noting that during the pandemic, the health care capacity and coverage of the health system in most countries has been significantly reduced: waiting lists increased and emphasis has been placed on medical and psychotherapeutic care in online format in order to avoid travel and meeting in person, something that has left in a vulnerable situation those who do not have good access to the Internet or knowledge to use it.

These kinds of changes that have occurred on a global scale, taking place throughout society at once, has led many people to feel particularly exposed to danger, a breeding ground from which cases of agoraphobia can arise with relative ease. There has been a feeling that a large mass of people have moved in unison to protect themselves from the virus, following strict and radical measures, but at the same time without being able to offer complete protection to those who do not have it easy to follow in the footsteps of the rest or start from a more delicate.

• Related article: "Are there mental sequelae from COVID-19?"

A disorder that exploits our vulnerabilities

As we have seen, in the pandemic there have been several conditions capable of affecting us psychologically.

On the one hand, the pandemic has been part of the main news of the day for months, since its effects have been felt in all areas of society. On the other hand, governments have applied very significant health restrictions that have affected the day-to-day life of people in very basic aspects, demanding citizen collaboration to act as a block and curb the curve of infections. And on the other, for a significant period, the health system has been overwhelmed by the situation.

Because of this, All the ingredients have been given for a psychological disorder such as agoraphobia to gain influence over a significant part of the population, both quantitatively (being developed by more people) and qualitatively (finding in daily situations more elements to "lean on" and stay active, affecting health mental). This has happened this way because:

• For many months it has been difficult to stay away from ideas or images that exploited the fears of the population (sometimes for sensationalism, sometimes to keep citizen collaboration active in the prevention of infections).
• Particularly vulnerable minorities have appeared who may have felt displaced or alienated because the public narrative about the measures to claim and apply to fight the virus did not represent them, feeding the idea that they were alone before the danger.
• The fact of having gone through the disease can leave psychological sequels at least in the short and medium term, long enough for other psychopathologies to arise from these fears, such as agoraphobia.
• For months, fear has been instilled about the idea of ​​going down busy streets due to a hypothetical increase of the risk of infection (although later it was shown that the vast majority of infections occur in interiors).
• In the months of the toughest restrictions, confinement at home could mean that for many people the The only safe place becomes your own home, making it difficult to lose your fear of going out into the night. Street.

All these images and ideas linked to fear have been transmitted and reinforced over and over again through the media and everyday conversations, so it is not surprising that mental health problems have skyrocketed in this period. And for this reason, the possibility of going to psychotherapy to overcome disorders such as agoraphobia is more important than ever.

• You may be interested: "What is fear? Characteristics of this emotion"

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