ABSTRACT
Background: The COVID-19 pandemic emerged from Wuhan, China and has spread across the world and raised public health concerns. To curb the spread of the disease, the government has imposed prevention measures. The objective of this study was to examine the compliance of people with infection prevention practices during the third wave of the pandemic to provide an updated insight into the situation and help policy makers in designing effective measures. Methods This was an online survey of the general population in Afghanistan from April, 2021 to May, 2021. Non-probability convenience sampling technique was used to recruit the respondents. The target sample size was found to be around 1,094 respondents. Data collection was guided through self-administered questionnaire developed by the researchers according to the World Health Organization (WHO) guidelines. Results From 1,094 respondents, 78% were male. Majority of the respondents were aged ≤ 30 years and had an undergraduate education. Nearly, 1 in 3 participants were healthcare workers and 70% were living in households with 5 or more family members. Overall, 70% of the respondents reported good preventive practices. No significant association found between male and female participants with regard to preventive practices against the COVID-19. The frequency of good preventive practices was significantly higher in participants more than 30 years old (p = 0.035), people with a post-graduate education (p = 0.025), healthcare workers (p = 0.002), and households with less than five family members (p = 0.002). Conclusion Generally, the public in Afghanistan are following infection prevention rules. However, there are certain areas which require further improvement such as observing social distance and avoid shaking hands when meeting others. Negligence of these prevention practices can lead to the increase of infection transmission among people. Public awareness should be continued to keep the people supportive of the government policies. Social media, television advertisements, and similar platforms may be used for this purpose.