The Effect of Knowledge and Attitude toward Coronavirus Disease-19 Transmission Prevention Practice in South Sumatera Province, Indonesia

BACKGROUND: Globally, the number of coronavirus disease (COVID)-19 confirmation cases shows an exponential increase. In South Sumatera province, Indonesia, reported positive confirm cases in March 2020 as many as 5 cases, and within 2 months there was an increase to 196 times (982 cases) confirmation cases in May 2020. Transmission prevention practice is essential to inhibit the spread of COVID-19 and reduce the number of cases. Based on past studies, COVID-19 transmission prevention practice is affected by community characteristics, level of knowledge and attitudes, but there is no study conducted in Indonesia. AIM: The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of knowledge and attitudes toward COVID-19 transmission prevention practice. METHODS: The study was conducted with cross-sectional study approach. The sample is the people lived in South Sumatra who filled out the questionnaire through the Google form application, total 1187 people. Data were collected by snowball method during the period of April 18–30th 2020. Data were analyzed statistically using multiple logistic regression tests. RESULTS: The result of this study found that four variables significantly affected COVID-19 transmission prevention practice. They were occupation (odds ratio [OR]: 1.128; p < 0.01), gender (OR: 1.309; p < 0.05), knowledge (OR: 1.782; p < 0.01), and attitude (OR: 2.059; p < 0.01). CONCLUSION: The dominant factor affecting COVID-19 transmission prevention practice is attitude and knowledge. Hence, it is necessary to increase community knowledge about COVID-19 better to change people’s attitudes toward COVID-19 transmission prevention so they can implement good COVID-19 transmission prevention practice