ABSTRACT
Objective: The purpose of this study is to understand the impact of Covid-19 pandemic on the physical and mental health of Portuguese teachers. Method(s): The sample consists of 1779 Portuguese teachers (1423 female and 356 male);58% (n=1029) over 50 years of age;72.7% (n= 1293) with more than 21 years of service;and 48.1% (n= 856) teaching 3rd cycle/secondary school. We studied the distribution of responses for the variables: professional wellbeing, exhaustion, cognitive problems, musculoskeletal dysfunctions and voice disorders, and performed an analysis of variance (ANOVA), followed by Bonferroni post-hoc test (p<.05), according to gender, age, years of service and teaching level. Result(s): 13.6% of the teachers reported feeling ill-being during the performance of their professional activity;85.6% exhaustion;74% musculoskeletal disorders;68.9% cognitive problems;and 59.7% voice disorders. The results according to gender, age, years of service show significant differences in all health dimensions (p<.05), except for teaching level for musculoskeletal disorders (F=.982, p=.427). In all health dimensions, the most significant differences occurred in the groups of teachers aged 20-21 years and 56-70 years;length of service between 0-5 years and those of more than 21 years;and the teaching level between 1st cycle and special education, with the exception of professional well-being where the greatest difference was reported between preschool and 3rd cycle/secondary teachers (95% CI ].9076;4.6364[;p=.000). Conclusion(s): The Covid-19 pandemic has worsened teachers' health status and professional well-being. The impact of these results on the quality of teaching should be the focus of future studies.