The pharmacist on the front lines to combat the COVID-19 pandemic: challenges encountered in drug stores in downtown Ubá-MG

Abstract

The World Health Organization (WHO) declared COVID-19 caused by the new coronavírus called SARS-CoV-2 as a pandemic in March 2020 and since then, theen tire commercial sector has been directly affected, needing to adaptto a new reality. Among these, drug stores, health establishments considered essential, which all owed their normal operation, however, requiring the adoption of new stricter security measures in order to mitigate occupation al risk and prevent contamination by the afore mentioned virus. That said, the objective of this work was to identify the changes implemented in drug stores in the city of Ubá-MG and to recognize the main difficulties observed by pharmacists to adapt to the new reality. To this end, eighteen drug stores located in the central region of the city of Ubá-MG were analyzed through the application of na electronic questionnaire to all pharmacists in charge of each establishment. The Project was approved by the research ethics committee and all objective data were analyzed through descriptive quantitative analysis. After analysis, it was found that among them ain safety measures observed was the use of a maskand facial protection (83.32%) andthe use of 70% alcohol to clean hands and surfaces. All drug stores were following the safety protocols recommended by the Ministry of Health and the World Health Organization, which guaranteed the safety of all employees who were on the front line and al soof the public served. Since this article is considered a relevant research source because it adresses importante aspect sabout the protocol sused by pharmacists in drug stores, to avoid contamination of employees and patients by COVID-19.