Background Great efforts have been made to prevent the spread of COVID-19, including national initiatives to promote the change of personal behaviors. The lessons learned from the 2003 SARS outbreak indicate that knowledge and attitudes about infectious diseases are related to panic among the population, which may further complicate efforts to prevent the spread of infectious diseases. Misunderstandings may result in behaviors such as underestimation, panic, and taking ineffective measures to avoid infection; these behaviors are likely to cause the epidemic to spread further. Objective The purpose of this study is to assess public health perceptions and misunderstandings about COVID-19 in China, and to propose targeted response measures based on the findings to control the development of the epidemic. Methods The study was conducted in April 2020 through an online survey, with participants in 8 provinces in Eastern, Central, and Western China. We designed a questionnaire with a health knowledge section consisting of 5 questions (4 conventional questions and 1 misleading question) on clinical features of and preventive measures against COVID-19. Descriptive statistics, chi-square analysis, binary logistic regression, and Mantel-Haenszel hierarchical analysis were used for statistical analysis. Results In total, 4788 participants completed the survey and the mean knowledge score was 4.63 (SD 0.67), gained mainly through experts (76.1%), television (60.0%), newspapers (57.9%), and opinions (46.6%) and videos (42.9%) from social media. Compared to those who obtained information from only 1 or 2 channels, people who obtained information from >3 channels had increased health perception and a better ability to identify misleading information. Suggestions from experts were the most positive information source (χ2=41.61), while information on social media was the most misleading. Those aged >60 years (OR 1.52, 95% CI 1.10-2.11), those with a lower or middle income (OR 1.36, 95% CI 1.00-1.83), those not working and not able to work (OR 1.83, 95% CI 1.04-3.21), those with a household income <100,000 RMB (
【저자키워드】 COVID-19, public health, SARS-CoV-2, coronavirus, pandemic, knowledge, Rapid, perceptions, Online, surveys, 【초록키워드】 Diseases, COVID-19 pandemic, media, risk, Symptom, Infectious disease, Population, Spread, China, Health, outbreak, Logistic regression, information, questionnaire, clinical feature, Analysis, statistical analysis, Panic, preventive measure, Government, Hierarchical, Regulation, 95% CI, Descriptive statistics, measure, effort, participant, National, positive, Mantel-Haenszel, Multiple, suggestion, objective, Prevent, the epidemic, spread of COVID-19, IMPROVE, Result, identify, conducted, 2003 SARS, were used, question, promote, reduce, groups, the mean, complicate, increased the risk, knowledge score, misunderstanding, 【제목키워드】 survey, Perception,