TY  - JOUR
AU  - Ainsworth, Ben
AU  - Miller, Sascha
AU  - Denison-Day, James
AU  - Stuart, Beth
AU  - Groot, Julia
AU  - Rice, Cathy
AU  - Bostock, Jennifer
AU  - Hu, Xiao-Yang
AU  - Morton, Katherine
AU  - Towler, Lauren
AU  - Moore, Michael
AU  - Willcox, Merlin
AU  - Chadborn, Tim
AU  - Gold, Natalie
AU  - Amlôt, Richard
AU  - Little, Paul
AU  - Yardley, Lucy
PY  - 2021
DA  - 2021/2/25
TI  - Infection Control Behavior at Home During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Observational Study of a Web-Based Behavioral Intervention (Germ Defence)
JO  - J Med Internet Res
SP  - e22197
VL  - 23
IS  - 2
KW  - COVID-19
KW  - novel coronavirus
KW  - behavior change
KW  - digital medicine
KW  - infection control
KW  - infectious disease
KW  - protection
KW  - digital health
AB  - Background: To control the COVID-19 pandemic, people should adopt protective behaviors at home (self-isolation, social distancing, putting shopping and packages aside, wearing face coverings, cleaning and disinfecting, and handwashing). There is currently limited support to help individuals conduct these behaviors. Objective: This study aims to report current household infection control behaviors in the United Kingdom and examine how they might be improved. Methods: This was a pragmatic cross-sectional observational study of anonymous participant data from Germ Defence between May 6-24, 2020. Germ Defence is an open-access fully automated website providing behavioral advice for infection control within households. A total of 28,285 users sought advice from four website pathways based on household status (advice to protect themselves generally, to protect others if the user was showing symptoms, to protect themselves if household members were showing symptoms, and to protect a household member who is at high risk). Users reported current infection control behaviors within the home and intentions to change these behaviors. Results: Current behaviors varied across all infection control measures but were between sometimes (face covering: mean 1.61, SD 1.19; social distancing: mean 2.40, SD 1.22; isolating: mean 2.78, SD 1.29; putting packages and shopping aside: mean 2.75, SD 1.55) and quite often (cleaning and disinfecting: mean 3.17, SD 1.18), except for handwashing (very often: mean 4.00, SD 1.03). Behaviors were similar regardless of the website pathway used. After using Germ Defence, users recorded intentions to improve infection control behavior across all website pathways and for all behaviors (overall average infection control score mean difference 0.30, 95% CI 0.29-0.31). Conclusions: Self-reported infection control behaviors other than handwashing are lower than is optimal for infection prevention, although handwashing is much higher. Advice using behavior change techniques in Germ Defence led to intentions to improve these behaviors. Promoting Germ Defence within national and local public health and primary care guidance could reduce COVID-19 transmission. 
SN  - 1438-8871
UR  - https://www.jmir.org/2021/2/e22197
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2196/22197
UR  - http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33566791
DO  - 10.2196/22197
ID  - info:doi/10.2196/22197
ER  -