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A comparative cross-sectional survey among medical and engineering students about awareness and preventive practices during lockdown for COVID-19 pandemic

Background: The WHO declared COVID-19 infection as a pandemic in March 2020 due to high infectivity and wide information is freely available regarding precautionary measures. Every sector of the society must follow the preventive steps in the absence of proper drugs or vaccines. There is a need to assess the awareness level and precautionary measures adopted by the different sectors of the society. Hence, we planned this comparative study among students of health and engineering professionals. Methodology: This cross-sectional survey was conducted among medical and engineering students from one of the respective college of Wardha district (July–September 2020). Second class randomly selected and all students, i.e., 200 from each faculty were involved. Questionnaire was prepared by referring guidelines of the World Health Organization and Ministry of Health and Family Welfare for preventive measures toward COVID-19 pandemic, shared by internet and Chi-square test applied. Results: One hundred and seventy-eight medical and 176 engineering students responded (response rate-89%). Significantly high numbers of medical students (84%) were well aware with various modes of infection spread than engineering (40%–68%) (P = 0.0001). Seventy-four percent engineering as compared to 53% medical students recognized >3 feet as safe social distance (P = 0.01) and sincerely maintained by engineering students (69.32%) more often than medical (55.6%) (P = 0.01); whereas wearing mask for outdoor activity was practiced more frequently by medical (76.97%) than engineering (52.84%) (P = 0.0001). About 29% both group students never moved out from home. 50% medical and 37% engineering students were moved out occasionally before survey and mostly for purchasing daily needs. Conclusion: Overall, there is gap in complete chain of knowledge about novel coronavirus among both the groups. There is a significant difference in awareness and practices adopted by both professional students toward COVID-19 pandemic. High awareness and safe practices may be expected for medical background, but contrast findings for some markers were observed. The mode of IEC should be robust, more modified, or innovative.