The COVID-19 pandemic could worsen the psychological well-being of people with disabilities in Cambodia

How the COVID-19 pandemic affected people with disabilities in the Global South is little known. This paper examines how disability was associated with people’s psychological well-being during the pandemic in Cambodia, and explores pandemic-related shocks as potential mechanisms. We collaborated with the national statistical office of Cambodia to design and implement a module on psychological well-being and COVID-19-related shocks in the 2021 Cambodia Socio-Economic Survey (official statistics). Our analysis of this unique, nationally representative data employs careful sample trimming (excluding disabilities due to aging), matching (of 276 disabled working-age adults with those without disabilities, within villages and districts), and regression analysis. The results show that disability was associated with lower subjective well-being (happiness and life satisfaction) and higher depression. The mediation analysis suggests distinct pathways for these adverse associations: pandemic-related economic shock (nonemployment) for physical disabilities and health shock (perceived risk of infection) for non-physical disabilities. Our findings provide novel representative evidence for the potentially intense vulnerability to the pandemic and underlying mechanisms among disabled people in the Global South, suggesting disability-inclusive policies addressing economic and health shocks to sustain their psychological well-being for future pandemics.