Psychological and Psychiatric Impact of the Coronavirus Pandemic

Abstract

On the eve of 4th May, the date when the lockdown was to end, people could stand it no more! The wait was not only hard, but also full of doubts about what level of freedom people could enjoy in their future. That caused a serious crisis which came after a previous, serious legitimacy crisis that the western political system, and not only Italian, had been going through for a long time. In an interview available in L’Avvenire of last 15th April, the ninety-year-old sociologist Edgar Morin defined the present situation as a “poly-crisis.” Long ago, citizens had already ceased to trust the political system and every other type of power. But, since nowadays, in Europe and the United States, the regimes are, for the most part, democratic, we can conclude that citizens have long lost their capacity to believe in themselves, to trust their evaluations. Moreover, there is a reason.