COVID-19 and adolescent girls’ mental health in Uganda: A panel data analysis

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic and associated mitigating measures are expected to aggravate the mental health challenges of adolescents. Poor mental health among young people is of concern in itself but is also known to affect long-term outcomes. Given the global burden of the pandemic, it is particularly concerning that limited empirical evidence currently exists for young women, especially in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), where the pandemic serves as an additional psychosocial stressor for the already challenging lives that most young women in low-resource contexts experience. This article adds to the existing evidence base by drawing on 3 rounds of panel data (2019–2021) to assess changes in adolescent mental health among 468 young women aged 13–19 years residing in rural to semi-urban villages in Uganda before and during the pandemic. Using fixed effects models, we find increases in symptoms of moderate-to-severe depression as measured by both the Patient Health Questionnaire-8 during the pandemic and accompanying lockdown measures. We also find that adolescent girls who faced a higher COVID-19 burden exhibit stronger declines in mental health. Our findings shed light on the impacts of the pandemic on young women’s mental health in an LMIC context, and suggest the need for age-, gender-, and vulnerability-targeted policies that ensure that the pandemic does not undo current progress toward a more gender equitable world.