The COVID-19 and Munchausen Syndrome

Yadollah    Abolfathi    Momtaz

Abstract

Currently, during the COVID-19 pandemic, some people are pretending to have COVID-19. The pretending to have COVID-19 can be considered as a symptom of Munchausen syndrome. It can be speculated that people with factitious disorders may pretend to have COVID-19 because of an inner need to get the sympathy and special attention from others; therefore, it is imperative that this issue should be studied with a multidisciplinary approach. In addition, people should not share any message from those pretending to have COVID-19 that may result in increasing public stress.

Keywords: COVID-19, Munchausen syndrome, public health, social media, public stress, pandemic.

[1] 
Ren S-Y, Gao R-D, Chen Y-L. Fear can be more harmful than the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 in controlling the corona virus disease 2019 epidemic. World J Clin Cases  2020; 8(4): 652-7.
[http://dx.doi.org/10.12998/wjcc.v8.i4.652] [PMID: 32149049] 
[2] 
Filho SD, Kanomata EY, Feldman RJ, Neto MA. Munchausen syndrome and Munchausen syndrome by proxy: a narrative review. Einstein (Sao Paulo)  2017; 15(4): 516-21.
[http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/s1679-45082017md3746] [PMID: 29364370] 
[3] 
Huffman JC, Stern TA. The diagnosis and treatment of Munchausen’s syndrome. Gen Hosp Psychiatry  2003; 25(5): 358-63.
[http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0163-8343(03)00061-6] [PMID: 12972228] 
[4] 
Turner J, Reid S. Munchausen’s syndrome. Lancet  2002; 359(9303): 346-9.
[http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(02)07502-5] [PMID: 11830219] 

Rights & Permissions Print Cite

Article Metrics

15

1

Journal Information

For Authors

For Editors

For Reviewers

Explore Articles

Open Access

Open Access Articles

For Visitors

DOI https://dx.doi.org/10.2174/2666796701999200818152652	Print ISSN 2666-7967
Publisher Name Bentham Science Publisher	Online ISSN 2666-7975

Coronaviruses

The COVID-19 and Munchausen Syndrome

Abstract

Related Journals

Related Books

Related Articles