EXAMINATION OF THE AFFECT OF THE QUARANTINE DURING THE SARS-COV-2 PANDEMIC ON BODY COMPOSITION VALUES

Problem Statement: Staying and working at home due to SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, caused a lack of physical activity and lead people to be more inactive and incent to consume more unhealty food during the day comparing with pre-pandemic. Balanced nutrition and physical activity are important in terms of keeping body composition values at optimum and therefore staying healthy. Approach: Many factors exist that could affect body composition values, however, balanced nutrition and physical activity are foremost effective. These, in particular, affect the body's fat-muscle ratios and body mass index (BMI). Purpose: In the study, it was aimed to examine the relationship between body composition values and nutrition and physical activities of the three-month quarantine period due to the SARS-CoV-2 (Covid-19) pandemic. For this purpose, body composition values of 16 subjects before and after the quarantine period were evaluated in terms of weight, body fat mass, total body water, mass out of fat, visceral fat, obesity, body mass index, muscle mass. Results: Nutrition and physical activity data of the subjects were determined by examining the questionnaire applied to the subjects. A significant correlation (p <0.05) was found between the obesity value and the subjects who consumed the same or less food during quarantine comparing with pre-pandemic. Moreover, it was observed that there were statistically significant decreases (p <0.05) in the weight, body fat mass, obesity and visceral fat values, and a remarkable decrease (p <0.001) in BMI value of the subjects who had to work during the quarantine. Conclusions: Hereby; it is seen that stable nutrition and work-life positively affect body composition values. It was determined that specifically, the working subjects ameliorate their body composition values, thus may have better health. The Online Journal of Recreation and Sport – October 2021 Volume 10, Issue 4 https://dergipark.org. tr/tr/pub/tojras www.tojras. com Copyright © The Online Journal of Recreation and Sport 33 INTRODUCTION The SARS-CoV-2 (Covid-19) outbreak, which started in Wuhan, China in December 2019, quickly spread to the entire world. It was expected to remain epidemic such as SARS-CoV or MERS-CoV (Drosten et al., 2003; Zaki et al., 2012), however, SARS-COV-2 rapidly turned out to pandemic which leads many countries to take rapid measures. The measures aim to minimize the risk of transmission began with the mask-wearing exigency, then evolve to curfew and quarantines (WHO, 2020). The first case was seen in Turkey on 11 March 2020 as part of this process, a number of measures were taken and restrictions swiftly began. Thereupon the restrictions, warnings and fear of the people, the general public stayed at home for three months and did not leave their homes until the decrease of restrictions due to the downturn in the number of cases (MOH, 2020; MOIA; 2020). Staying and working at home due to restrictions, caused a lack of physical activity involuntarily. This causes people to be more inactive and incent to consume more unhealty food during the day comparing with prepandemic (Ammar et al., 2020; Blaszczyk-Bebenek et al., 2020; Carter et al., 2020). Balanced nutrition and physical activity are important in terms of keeping body composition values at optimum and therefore staying healthy (Ammar et al., 2020; Chen et al., 2020; Martinez-Ferran et al., 2020; Narici et al., 2020). The importance of balanced nutrition for health is selfevident (Ammar et al., 2020; Blaszczyk-Bebenek et al., 2020; Zachary et al., 2020). Nutrition, which is one of the fundamental instinct of humans; is taking the essential nutrients into the body at regular intervals and sufficient levels to grow and develop and to continue their life in a healthy way. Adequate and balanced food consumption is required for a healthy diet. If the energy taken into the body is more than the energy that the body burns, the excess energy is stored as fat. Therefore, it negatively affects body composition, especially with fat-related values. Eventually, a number of problems may arise such as weight, obesity and visceral fatness. To prevent this condition, the food variety should be abundant and balanced (Butler and Barrientos, 2020; Carter et al., 2020; Martinez-Ferran et al., 2020; Narici et al., 2020). On the other hand, physical activity is another event that ensures the continuity of life. A short walk, a short workout and even cleaning can be evaluated within the scope of physical activity. To summarize physical activity; is the whole movements, works and actions in routine life. In this sense, every activity that ends with the use of energy by the organism is considered as physical activity (Aykin and Bilir, 2017). To exemplify, working is a physical activity in itself. Contrary to this, activities such as sitting and sleeping can be considered as inactive/sedentary times without physical activity. It is inevitable that physical activity also affects body composition values, as it is associated with energy consumption (Chastin et al., 2012; Chen et al., 2020; Narici et al., 2020; Zachary et al., 2020). Many factors exist that could affect body composition values, however, balanced nutrition and physical activity are foremost effective. These, in particular, affect the body's fat-muscle ratios and body mass index (BMI). Also, in the formation of body composition; fats, bones, muscles, extracellular fluids and other organic substances The Online Journal of Recreation and Sport – October 2021 Volume 10, Issue 4 https://dergipark.org. tr/tr/pub/tojras www.tojras. com Copyright © The Online Journal of Recreation and Sport 34 such as minerals and proteins are present in the organism (Carter et al., 2020; Hu, 2008; Kyle et al., 2003). Changes in these values are directly related to health (Carter et al., 2020; Chastin et al., 2012; Chen et al., 2020). In the quarantine and restrictions processes that occur due to the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, the routine life patterns of people frankly changed (Bhutani and Cooper, 2020) and it has been considered that this circumstance may also affect body composition values, especially related to nutrition and physical activity. This study aims to reveal how staying at home during quarantine affects the relationship between nutrition and physical activities and body composition values. The four essential hypotheses established for this aim are as follows; subjects who consume the same or less food during the quarantine than the pre-pandemic period should have better body composition values than those who are consuming more, subjects who had to work during the quarantine should have better body composition values compared to the subjects who do not work, subjects who engage in any physical activity even for a short time during the quarantine, should have better body composition values, subjects who are more active/less sedentary during the quarantine should have better body composition values compared to the subjects who are less active.