The Methodological Problem of Identifying Criterion A Traumatic Events During the COVID‐19 Era: A Commentary on Karatzias et al. (2020)

A recent study published in the Journal of Traumatic Stress demonstrated that posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) rates in Ireland are as high as 17.7% and that this could be related to the COVID-19 pandemic (Karatzias et al., 2020). However, this number is probably skewed, as the fundamental requirement for a PTSD diagnosis—namely, a life-threatening or severely stressful event—was not fulfilled. In this comment, the consideration of COVID-19–related PTSD to represent a diagnosis is questioned based on the definitions of PTSD in the ICD-11 and DSM-5.