Brain volumetric changes in the general population following the COVID-19 outbreak and lockdown

Description: COVID-19 pandemic led to severe health and financial conditions worldwide. As an attempt to reduce the pandemic spread, most countries followed a lockdown policy albeit its devastating financial cost. It was generally reported, during and after the lockdown period, on an increase in anxiety and stress among the population. In the current study, we explored the manifestations of this period on the brain structure. Hypothesizing that the lockdown period might have induced stress-related brain modification, we examined volumetric changes in N = 100 participants scanned in two time-points. We examined the neural changes observed in n = 50 participants scanned before and after the lockdown period, and compared these changes to a control group of n = 50 participants that were scanned twice before the lockdown.