Adherence to physical contact restriction measures and the spread of COVID-19 in Brazil.

Szwarcwald, Célia Landmann; Souza Júnior, Paulo Roberto Borges de; Malta, Deborah Carvalho; Barros, Marilisa Berti de Azevedo; Magalhães, Mônica de Avelar Figueiredo Mafra; Xavier, Diego Ricardo; Saldanha, Raphael de Freitas; Damacena, Giseli Nogueira; Azevedo, Luiz Otávio; Lima, Margareth Guimarães; Romero, Dália; Machado, Ísis Eloah; Gomes, Crizian Saar; Werneck, André de Oliveira; Silva, Danilo Rodrigues Pereira da; Gracie, Renata; Pina, Maria de Fátima de

OBJECTIVE To analyze the adherence of the population to physical contact restriction measures and the spread of COVID-19 in Brazil. METHODS This was a web-based health survey carried out from April 24 to May 24 2020 using a chain sampling procedure. Intensity of adherence to physical contact restriction measures was analyzed according to sociodemographic characteristics, using logistic regression models to investigate associations with 'No/little adherence'. RESULTS Of the 45,161 participants, 74.2% (73.8;74.6%) reported intense adherence to the measures. The group that did not adhere to the measures was characterized by men (31.7%), those aged 30 to 49 (36.4%), those with low education levels (33.0%), those who worked during the pandemic (81.3%), those resident in the North (28.1%) and Midwest (28.5%) regions of the country. In Brazil as a whole, there was a decrease in COVID-19 daily growth rates, from 45.4% to 5.0%. CONCLUSION A large part of the Brazilian population adhered to physical contact restriction measures, which possibly contributed to decreasing the spread of COVID-19.