AUTHOR=Li Manyun , Long Jiang , Wang Xuyi , Liao Yanhui , Liu Yueheng , Hao Yuzhu , Wu Qiuxia , Zhou Yanan , Wang Yingying , Wang Yunfei , Wang Qianjin , Ma Yuejiao , Chen Shubao , Liu Tieqiao 

TITLE=A Comparison of COVID-19 Stigma and AIDS Stigma During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Cross-Sectional Study in China

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Psychiatry

VOLUME=12

YEAR=2021

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychiatry/articles/10.3389/fpsyt.2021.782501

DOI=10.3389/fpsyt.2021.782501

ISSN=1664-0640

ABSTRACT=<p><bold>Objective:</bold> To understand the current situation of stigmatizing attitudes toward Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) in China and compare it with acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS).</p><p><bold>Methods:</bold> Convenient sampling and vignette-based methods were used to recruit participants on WeChat. A demographic form and adopted stigma scale were used to collect participants' demographic information and stigmatizing attitudes toward COVID-19 and AIDS.</p><p><bold>Results:</bold> A total of 13,994 questionnaires were included in this study. A high portion of participants tend to avoid contact with individuals affected with COVID-19 (74.3%) or AIDS (59.0%), as well as their family members (70.4% for COVID-19 and 47.9% for AIDS). About half of the participants agreed that affected persons could not only cause problems to their own family but also have adverse effects on others (59.6% and 55.6% for COVID-19, 56.9 and 47.0% for AIDS). The agreements with statements about perceived stigma were similar but slightly higher than those about personal stigma in both COVID-19 and AIDS. Participants' agreements with all statements regarding personal and perceived stigma attitudes between COVID-19 and AIDS were all statistically significant (<italic>p</italic> &lt; 0.001). Participants obtained COVID-19-related information mainly from social media (91.3%) and newspaper or television (77.1%) during the epidemic, and 61.0% of them thought information from newspapers or television was the most reliable.</p><p><bold>Conclusion:</bold> Several similarities and differences of people's attitude toward COVID-19 and AIDS were found. Avoidance, blame, and secondary discrimination to diagnosed persons and their surrounding persons were the main representations of COVID-19-related stigma. Stigma of COVID-19 had less moral link but more public panic. Experience from HIV-related stigma reduction and prevention can be applied to reduce COVID-19-related stigma.</p>