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Profile.Overweight man: the perfect victim of Covid-19
From the beginning of the SARS-CoV-2 epidemic, overweight and obesity quickly proved to be an important risk factor in ICUs around the world.
Now, a new study conducted on nearly 150,000 adults in more than 200 US hospitals confirms this.
According to the researchers involved, from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), among people with obesity, as the body mass index (BMI) increases, the risk of hospitalization and death rises.
Specifically, patients with a BMI above 45 were 33% more likely to be admitted and
61% more likely to die than those of a healthy weight
.
These findings "highlight the serious clinical public health implications of a high BMI and suggest the continued need for intensive management of Covid-19 disease, especially among people affected by severe obesity," says Lyudmyla Kompaniyets, the lead author of the work and health economist in the Division of Nutrition, Physical Activity and Obesity of the CDC.
A healthy weight not only excludes being overweight, but also being underweight.
In fact, the study authors stress that these people are also more likely to be admitted to the intensive care unit and to die.
A BMI below 18.5 had a 20% higher risk of being hospitalized
than those of a healthy weight.
The reasons are not entirely clear, but it may be due to the fact that some of these patients were malnourished or frail or had other illnesses.
To reach these conclusions, Kompaniyets and his team used a database of Covid-19 cases to identify 148,494 adults who received a diagnosis of the disease in US hospitals from March 2020 to December.
They calculated each patient's BMI and looked for correlations with a variety of severe outcomes, including hospitalization, admission to intensive care units, need for mechanical ventilation, and death.
In this way, they found that obesity (BMI above 30) increased the risk of both hospitalization and death.
Patients with a BMI of 30 to 34.9 were only 7% more likely to be hospitalized
and 8% more likely to die than people who were of a healthy weight, but the risks increased dramatically as the BMI was rising.
Previous studies already pointed to this clear relationship between Covid-19 and obesity, but they were smaller and limited.
Kompaniyets and colleagues also documented a linear relationship between BMI and the likelihood of needing mechanical ventilation.
The higher the BMI, the more likely it is that a patient will require such an intervention, which is invasive and can bring serious complications.
A little fat can protect
After analyzing all the affected patients, the researchers observed a curious fact and that is that the best results were found between what is considered healthy and being overweight.
Somehow, and consistent with some previous studies, it seems that a few extra pounds could help protect people when they contract an infectious disease.
"Exactly why this association exists is unknown," acknowledges Alyson Goodman, a pediatrician and medical epidemiologist at the CDC and a co-author of the research.
One possibility is that
having a little extra fat can provide much-needed energy stores
during the course of a prolonged illness.
The findings highlight the importance of carefully managing the care of severely obese patients and ensuring that obese people have access to vaccines and other preventive measures.
Provides further evidence for the recommendation to vaccinate those with a BMI above or below healthy as soon as possible.
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