ATHENS – The effect of lockdowns that kept people mostly confined to their homes for months during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic that began in March 2020 showed children were hard hit by the isolation.

That was found in a study, The Effects of COVID-19 Restrictive Measures on the Rights of the Child by Antonios Kouroutakis, an Assistant Professor at the IE University in Madrid said Kathimerini.

The study was conducted under the auspices of the Ombudsman in collaboration with the UNICEF Greece Country Office and with the coordination of the Assistant Ombudsman for the Rights of the Child.

Perhaps not surprising was just how severe the emotional toll was, with 87.2 percent of parent or guardians noticing their children were more anxious, and 42.2 percent experiencing emotional transitions.

Junior high and high school students who had to take classes online with schools shut down lost touch with their friends for the most part, despite being allowed for exercise with social distancing.

The study showed 90.6 percent of teens weren’t happy with taking remote courses by themselves and 53.1 percent said there were Internet connection problems disrupting those classes and had difficulty concentrating.

The research drew on questionnaires distributed electronically to children, parents, teachers and others, the paper also said.