Abstract

Introduction The current COVID-19 pandemic has shifted the focus of health promotion and health education strategies of healthcare policymakers from primary healthcare programmes to COVID-19 prevention and mitigation. This research was done to determine if Social Isolation influences the Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs) screening habits of Jamaicans during the COVID-19 Pandemic.
Objectives 1. To examine the relationship between social isolation due to the COVID-19 Pandemic and the Sexually Transmitted Infections screening rates of Jamaicans. 2. To know if Jamaicans are at risk for Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs) transmission during the COVID-19 Pandemic.
Methods and Materials: An online cross-sectional survey was used to evaluate the influence of social isolation due to COVID-19 on Sexual Transmitted Infections (STIs) screening rates of Jamaicans 458 respondents participated in the online survey who were selected randomly with ages ranging from 18 years of age to greater than 65 years of age. The data was entered into the IBM SPSS software for statistical analysis, including descriptive statistics, correlations, cross-tabulation, and chi-square testing.
Findings: At a class interval of 95% using a two-tailed significance, there is a correlation between sexual activity and condom use. As sexual activity increases(r=1), the use of condoms decreases(r=-509). Most sample respondents (55.90%) choose to practice social isolation, 37.12% choose to do so sometimes, and 6.9% decide not to do So.
Conclusion: There is a weak relationship between social isolation and STI testing, as evidenced by people stating that they are still getting screened even though they are in isolation.

Keywords: clinical services, COVID-19, Jamaica, PMT, sexual activity, social isolation, STIs