KAP-COVID: Knowledge, attitudes and practices regarding feeding during the COVID-19 pandemic in the capital cities of Ecuador and Peru

Introduction. The emergence of a pandemic leads to the modification of people's lifestyles, as well as behavioral and human behavior modifications. Objectives. Describe the knowledge, attitudes and practices of the population about food during confinement due to the COVID-19 pandemic in the capitals of Ecuador and Peru. Methods. Non-experimental, cross-sectional study. 875 individuals participated, residents of the cities of Quito and Lima. For data collection, an online form was developed where knowledge, attitudes and practices around food during confinement by COVID-19 were explored, all participants read the information and provided their informed consent. For the descriptive analysis, measures of central tendency and dispersion, number, percentage and confidence intervals were calculated. To establish an association between variables, the Chi-square statistical test was used. To establish statistically significant differences, a p-value <0.05 was considered. Results. The data of 875 adults between 18 and 74 years old, residing in the city of Quito (46.97%) and in the city of Lima (53.03%) were analyzed. 60.91% think that coronavirus disease can be prevented by eating a healthy diet and 82.97% think that a healthy diet can help in the treatment of this disease. 18.51% and 17.49%, respectively, have started to consume some nutritional supplement and / or some medicinal plant because they consider it to be beneficial for the prevention or treatment of coronavirus disease. The main source of information about foods that can help in the prevention or treatment of coronavirus disease has been social networks (54.26% Quito and 55.60% Lima, p>0.05). Conclusions. The mandatory confinement by COVID-19 has induced changes in the knowledge, attitudes and practices of the population in the capital cities of Ecuador and Peru.