Editorial

Dear Readers,
The COVID-19 pandemic has turned our clinical and scientific work and everyday life upside down. Right now, it has been over a year since the introduction of the outbreak alert. New challenges regarding the disease itself, its complications and consequences have been recognized, including both direct implications, such as increased incidence of thromboembolic episodes, chronic fatigue syndrome, and neurocognitive disturbances, and indirect ones, including higher indices of depression and anxiety among healthcare professionals and families of the deceased due to COVID-19 [1, 2]. The increasing loneliness rates related to compulsory isolation appear to be particularly detrimental, especially at this point [3].
We therefore would like to present this special issue of Advances in Psychiatry and Neurology, entitled “A year in a new world – biopsychosocial consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic”. We present both original work and review articles. The call for papers for this special issue has drawn a lot of attention and we have received many proposals for articles. Unfortunately, not all of them are published in the current issue. Due to such a great level of interest and high number of valuable contributions, we had to move several of the papers to the following issue of the journal. We are glad that the scope of the accepted articles is wide and related to important pandemic-related matters. During the outbreak, a new concept, regarding the psychological construct of psychological consequences related to the fear of being infected with SARS-CoV-2, emerged. The special issue starts with an article by Chodkiewicz and Gola on the Polish adaptation of questionnaires assessing fear of COVID-19 and death anxiety [4]. Additionally, we publish preliminary results of a study investigating coronavirus anxiety as a risk factor for depression, burnout and insomnia among nurses [5].
The current knowledge indicates that infection with SARS-CoV-2 may involve a psychiatric component. This topic was investigated by Khanpara et al. in a naturalistic, cross-sectional study [6]. Compulsory isolation and remote studying took their particular toll on children and adolescents. We present an original study by Sikorska et al. concerning the relationship between physical activity and mental health among adolescents during the lockdown [7]. Moreover, Kleszczewska-Albińska proposes, in her review, a framework for professional and...


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