Conceptualizing the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on people with opioid use disorder: an application of the social ecological model
Open Access
- 7 January 2021
- journal article
- editorial
- Published by Springer Science and Business Media LLC in Addiction Science & Clinical Practice
- Vol. 16 (1), 1-6
- https://doi.org/10.1186/s13722-020-00210-w
Abstract
The COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in unparalleled societal disruption with wide ranging effects on individual liberties, the economy, and physical and mental health. While no social strata or population has been spared, the pandemic has posed unique and poorly characterized challenges for individuals with opioid use disorder (OUD). Given the pandemic’s broad effects, it is helpful to organize the risks posed to specific populations using theoretical models. These models can guide scientific inquiry, interventions, and public policy. Models also provide a visual image of the interplay of individual-, network-, community-, structural-, and pandemic-level factors that can lead to increased risks of infection and associated morbidity and mortality for individuals and populations. Such models are not unidirectional, in that actions of individuals, networks, communities and structural changes can also affect overall disease incidence and prevalence. In this commentary, we describe how the social ecological model (SEM) may be applied to describe the theoretical effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on individuals with opioid use disorder (OUD). This model can provide a necessary framework to systematically guide time-sensitive research and implementation of individual-, community-, and policy-level interventions to mitigate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on individuals with OUD.Keywords
Funding Information
- National Institute on Drug Abuse (5P30DA011041)
- National Institute on Drug Abuse (5P30DA011041)
- National Institutes of Health (U48 DP005008)
- National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (1T32 HL129974-01)
- National Institute on Drug Abuse (3UG1DA015831-19S3)
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