ABSTRACT

ABSTRACT

COVID-19, a disease resulting from contamination by the Sars-Cov-2 virus, was declared a pandemic on March 11, 2020. The definition of a pandemic has a strong geographical component: for it to be declared, the presence of infected people must be detected on more than one continent. Thus, due to an increasingly connected world and how easy the transmission of viral infections has become, an accelerated evolution in the number of contagions and deaths caused by the disease was observed in COVID-19 pandemic, challenging public and health authorities in search for solutions for the global health emergency. The generation of information is essential for public managers' decisionmaking while conducting responses to the pandemic, as well as the development of protocols and actions to deal with the health emergency, especially in an environment of social inequality. In this context, the present study demonstrates the results obtained through an online survey conducted in the city of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, between April 7 and May 11, 2020. The survey included 15 questions related to people's perception of the impacts caused due to the pandemic and used GIS tools and applications, such as Survey123 Connect for ArcGIS, ArcGIS Online, Story Map, and Dashboard for ArcGIS. The data obtained from analysis were presented in map-format, word verifications were related to online research on Google Trends, and the construction of a scatterplot matrix were carried out aiming to identify and quantify the impacts endured by Rio de Janeiro's population after the arrival of the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition to the information obtained in the research, the official databases related to COVID-19 and data provided by Rio de Janeiro's city hall were used. Despite the limitations of the research in terms of the sample, representativeness, and spatial diversity, it was possible to verify the impacts upon the population through a survey carried out according to the city's different planning regions. Some differences were observed according to the socioeconomic level of the planning region. There was also concern about the loss of income caused by the pandemic and effects on the mental health of the population.

Keywords: COVID-19, impacts, online survey, Rio de Janeiro, spatial analysis