Presenter: Anahita Eshaghi, Public Health Science, Global Public Health Scholars
For my practicum, I analyzed the effects of COVID-19 in Tanzania, a low-income
country, evaluating the beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors at the community level. I worked on this practicum mainly virtually over zoom. It was under the supervision of Reva Datar, a Graduate Student at the University of Maryland, College Park. A total of 15 interviews were conducted with people who live in Tanzania currently during the pandemic. The interviews contained specific questions that were asked to all participants. Each response was analyzed in order to determine a codebook and thematic analysis in order to organize the responses. The importance of doing so was to determine specific themes that the participants shared or did not share. The thematic analysis had four main themes, individual’s beliefs, state of COVID-19, COVID-19 health actions, and community needs, barriers/facilitators. The internship is currently still going on. Now, we are in the works of writing the paper. The paper will be published, and I will be a contributing author. This internship relates strongly to public health because COVID-19 has posed a strong burden on many, especially those in low-income countries like Tanzania. Little to no research has been done on this country at the community-level. This must be done so that awareness must be raised, and future actions be taken in order to help them. I have learned that there is a great lack of education in Tanzania and their economy is greatly struggling due to this pandemic. I personally have a connection to this because I was born in a low-income country, so I want to play a part in raising awareness and a future plan for those less fortunate. As a person planning to work in Public Health, I believe any help is helpful.