The Impact of COVID-19 on College Students

The Impact of COVID-19 on College Students – Understanding the implications of the COVID-19 pandemic in a global society is critical as it founds preparation for potential health crises. The pandemic resulted in a critical death rate internationally, which has had detrimental effects on relatives’ psychological well-being (Coughenour et al., 2020).

Second, with the infection rates requiring expensive treatment facilities and resources, destabilization of the global public health sector was apparent. Furthermore, the pandemic altered nations’ economies by distorting employment, ultimately inducing people to low living standards, resulting in trauma and depression (World Health Organization, 2021). Such impacts are practical and evident in society at large, including college students.

Researchers have documented the social, economic, and psychological implications of COVID-19 in society. According to Chriscaden (2020), the pandemic increased poverty rates, raising the number of undernourished people by 132 million individuals.

Such statistics imply that the population suffering poverty-induced mental instability significantly increased with the pandemic. With over 1.8 million deaths globally by the end of 2020 for only countries that can quantify the cases effectively, the social and psychological impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic are inarguable (World Health Organization, 2021).

Overall, whether social, economic, or mental implications of the pandemic, the apparent harmful implications in the global community, at all ages, races, ethnic groups, and other social classes.

Specifically, college students should understand how the pandemic affected their social, economic, and psychological welfare to relate effectively and understand how their situations matched the practical health crisis implications. Such research offers the fundamental data and information to spur awareness and attention on the need to focus on college students when health crises occur.

According to World Health Organization (2021), the impacts of the pandemic on the global education system have had a deleterious implication on learners. Therefore, as nations focus on restoring the vulnerable population’s well-being, college students should not be excluded.

College students significantly suffered the pinche of the COVID-19 pandemic considering the social, economic, and political elements surrounding the health crisis. When the World Health Organization (WHO) pronounced the pandemic as a global health crisis, national governments had to take stringent measures to curb the infection spread, including barring physical and interactive classes in colleges.

Such a move distorted the higher learning bussing culture and proximity, inducing learners to critical psychological challenges. College students who were on internships lost their livelihoods, predisposing them to hard financial situations.

The death of relatives and friends due to the critical nature of the COVID-19 infections also pushed college students to hard life situations characterized by psychological and mental instability.

Therefore, although society might not focus on the college students significantly, they form a key group of individuals who suffered the pinches of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Literature Review

Researchers have exploratively studied the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on college students. With the practical effects of the pandemic on human health, including the substantial death rate, and the stay-at-home order in the United States (US), scholars have concluded significant implications in different research journals. Coughenour et al. (2020) and Lee et al. (2021) are among the key researchers exploring the pandemic’s implications on US college students.

Coughenour et al. (2020) explore the correlation between the stay-at-home order, learners’ involvement in physical activity at home, and psychological welfare. Their findings highlight that the pandemic had substantive negative effects on college students’ physical activities and psychological well-being.

Such inference implies that the indoor stay at home reduced the students’ involvement in physical exercises, which integrated with such other factors as the deaths of relatives and friends to contribute to stress and depression.

Also, the journal article concludes that non-American college students suffered more than American learners during the pandemic. Such inference implies that parents, guardians, the government, and the education fraternity should significantly focus on the students of color when health crises occur.

Impact of COVID-19 and Psychological implications

Lee et al. (2021) explores the social and psychological implications of the pandemic on US college students. The authors conclude that the pandemic significantly distorted the college students’ psychological welfare by minimizing physical interactions.

With the barn of physical classes and the indoor lifestyle, students had unreliable social interactions that augmented stress and depression. Ideally, the pandemic distorted the learners’ social life, inducing them to psychological instability. Also, the journal article highlights no significant social differences in the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. Such inferences oppose the common expectation that such groups like the LGBTQ+ and non-white students suffered many more challenges than the American students.

While the two research articles focus on different elements regarding the impacts of the pandemic on US college students, social versus psychological, they both posit critical alteration of mental welfare. For Coughenour et al. (2020), failure to engage substantially in physical activities during the pandemic and other social and economic conditions alter the students’ mental welfare.

***The Impact of COVID-19 on College Students***

Similarly, Lee et al. (2021) denote that the socioeconomic implications of the pandemic played a critical role in triggering depression and stress among college students. Both articles present practical arguments because inadequate engagement in physical activity, unreliable social interactions, loss of family members, and financial strains, to mention a few factors, would disrupt mental well-being.

Therefore, both articles reinforce damaging factual implications of COVID-pandemic on college students, recommending future comprehensive research to explore the subjects. However, the articles differ in defining the social variation of the pandemic implications on various social groups, including the blacks and the LGBTQ+ community.

Although Coughenour et al. (2020) infer significant differences of implications relating to sexual orientation, Lee et al. (2021) findings indicate no significant differences in any social group. Although the opposing inferences from both research works might be confusing, the differences in focus might have caused the diverse conclusions.

Notably, the often-societal discriminated groups, including the LGBTQ+ community and the blacks, might have perceived the indoor stay as an opportunity to evade stigmatization, hence evading outdoor physical engagements. Contrary, Lee et al. (2021) emphasize that the presence of strong organizations and groups supporting the minority groups provided reliable support during the pandemic, minimizing psychological breakdown among member college students. Therefore, the evident differences between the two articles are due to focus, which is normal in research studies.

Conclusion

In a nutshell, the COVID-19 pandemic is a fundamental health crisis, and its implications affect every member of society, including college students. Coughenour et al. (2020) and Lee et al. (2021) prove that the epidemic had deleterious impacts on college students’ welfare.

With alteration on learners’ social, economic, and psychological welfare, destabilization of individuals’ welfare was apparent. Such a fact requires the education sector and the global public health system to prepare adequately for future health crises and consider college students’ mental well-being as a key aspect. Researchers are also stakeholders as they will help offer objective findings, which are vital in initiating evidence-based strategies.

Further research should encompass the potential sustainable solutions to safeguard college students’ mental well-being during such health crises. Notably, after learning the practical existence of a social problem, the next step must be seeking a solution. The key lesson from the available research is that the community must find effective strategies to respond to future pandemics.

The need for an effectively coordinated integrative global health sector to handle future health crises in groups, including college learners, is inarguable. Therefore, besides the vital implications of the COVID-19 pandemic on students’ psychological and mental welfare, education and community stakeholders can prepare adequately to counter future destabilization.

References

Chriscaden, K. (2020). Impact of COVID-19 on people’s livelihoods, their health, and our food systems.

Coughenour, C., Gakh, M., Pharr, J. R., Bungum, T., & Jalene, S. (2020). Changes in depression and physical activity among college students on a diverse campus after a COVID-19 stay-at-home order.

Lee, J., Solomon, M., Stead, T., Kwon, B., & Ganti, L. (2021). Impact of COVID-19 on the mental health of US college students. BMC

World Health Organization. (2021). The impact of COVID-19 on global health goals.

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Global Impact of COVID-19 on the Balance of Economic and Political Power

The global outbreak of COVID-19 and the subsequent declaration of COVID-19 by the World Health Organization (WHO) as a global health emergency in January 2020 has caused a significant imbalance in the global economic and political powers. The first diagnosis of the virus in Wuhan, China has been followed by fast transmission of the virus to over 190 countries across the globe with focal points of the infection rapidly changing for China to Europe and now to the United States.

The outbreak of the pandemic has resulted in more than 2.1 million people across the world contracting the deadly viral disease with thousands of fatalities registered in different parts of the world (Sohrabi et al., 12). The economic sector has been hard hit. Based on the realism theory of international relations, the outbreak of COVID-19 can be understood as a factor that has been used by world political powers and economic giants to increase their political power and economic growth relative to others (Center for Strategic and International Studies 2). Both political and economic imbalance has been realized as possible consequences.

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With the continued increase in the number of infections across the world daily, more than 80 countries have closed their borders to stop international flights from the countries that are hardly hit by virus infections. Several businesses have been closed and the population in many countries have been forced to self-quarantine. Governments have closed schools in all countries across the world and about 1.5 billion children have been forced to stay at home with their parents (Center for Strategic and International Studies 3).

Over the period from Mid-March 2020 to Mid-April 2020, the world economic structure and severe political imbalance have been experienced. Precisely, there have been rising cases of filed unemployment, insurance, and rising prospects of future economic recession. The rising prospects of future economic recession have led to an increase in the rate of unemployment across the world and this continues to harm global economic growth and goodwill.

COVID-19 and the WHO

After the declaration of COVID-19 as a world pandemic by WHO on March 11, there have been indications of a negative impact on global economic growth. For example, the global trade, as well as the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of many countries, have been forecasted to decline sharply with a probability lying within the first half of the year 2020. The international economic and political structures have been imbalanced in terms of policymaking and trade activities.

Different sectors of the economy have been destroyed and severely affected such as the tourism and hospitality, the supply of medical facilities and equipment across the globe, the global value chains have been destroyed, consumer markets inconvenienced, financial and energy markets, transport sector, food as well as sports and recreational activities have all been severely affected(Fernandes 10). The effect of social distancing which is meant to enhance social interaction among people as a strategy to flatten the growth curve of the disease also has serious implications on business and the daily activities of people across the globe.

As a result of all these, the economic costs of survival have greatly increased across the world, with the situation being worse in developing countries.

Global Impact of COVID-19 — ***Figure 1: Gross Domestic Product, Percentage Change***

Source: World Economic Outlook, International Monetary Fund, April 14, 2020

The outbreak and spread of COVID-19 have also had a significant impact on global politics. From a critical perspective, it is argued that the pandemic has severely changed the status quo of partisan politics in terms of political conversation and this has affected international relations and international political economies as well.

For example, superpower countries such as the United States of America have been accused, through President Donald Trump, of showing little concern and taking meager measures towards containing the pandemic (University of South Carolina 1). This accusation has farther shaped the internal politics of the United States and their trade relations with China, Iran, Russia, Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq, and North Korea. The politics of the pandemic have also affected the conversations between the United States and the United Kingdom on Brexit and other issues regarding the efforts of containing the virus.

The break of the pandemic across the globe can also cause significant changes in the national political conversations on matters such as healthcare provision and coverage and this can affect several health workers across the globe. For example, recently, President Donald Trump stopped financial support to the World Health Organization and this continues the hot debate on whether the United States is concerned about ending the pandemic across the globe.

Besides, this is likely to affect the healthcare systems across the globe farther affecting international relations (University of South Carolina 2). There have also been concerns on the rise of authoritarian governments across the globe that have used the crisis as an avenue to tighten their grip of political powers and this continues to shape global politics in handy.

In conclusion, the political and economic imbalance resulting from the global outbreak of COVID-19 can be explored and understood from the realism theory of international relations. While global agencies such as WHO strives to contain the virus, other superpowers and world economic giants such as the United States have refused to show concerns over the efforts aimed at containing the virus.

This is politics of supremacy which continues to make the virus spread uncontrollably in many parts of the world. With the steady shift in the viral epicenter from Asia to Europe and now in the United States within three months since its outbreak in Wuhan, China, there have been severe economic impacts and political orientation in terms of the political conversations between the United States and other parts of the world. The prospects of world economic recession are expected to be severe than the 2008-2012 world economic crisis. The worst is yet to come!

Works Cited

Center for Strategic and International Studies. “COVID-19: New Reality.” Center for Strategic and International Studies, 15 Mar. 2020,

Center for Strategic and International Studies. “The Global Economic Impacts of COVID-19.” Center for Strategic and International Studies, 10 Mar. 2020,

The University of South Carolina. “COVID-19 Impact: How the Pandemic is Affecting Politics.” University of South Carolina, 14 Apr. 2020

Fernandes, Nuno. “Economic effects of coronavirus outbreak (COVID-19) on the world economy.” Available at SSRN 3557504 (2020).

Sohrabi, Catrin, et al. “World Health Organization declares global emergency: A review of the 2019 novel coronavirus (COVID-19).” International Journal of Surgery (2020).

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