Updated overview on the interplay between obesity and COVID-19

Abstract

The worldwide spread of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has generated a global health crisis and more than a million deaths so far. Epidemiological and clinical characteristics of COVID-19 are increasingly reported, along with its potential relationship with overweight and/or obesity. Therefore, we aim here to review the current scientific literature on the impact of overweight and/or obesity among hospitalized patients who have developed severe or critical forms of COVID-19. Following PRISMA guidelines, our literature search identified over 300 scientific articles using the keywords “obesity” and “COVID-19”, 22 of which were finally selected for reporting useful information on the association between overweight/obesity and disease severity. In particular, in 11 out of the 14 studies (79%) which evaluated the association between obesity and disease severity providing also a risk estimate (i.e., the odd ratio; OR), the OR value was constantly >2. Although the studies were found to be heterogeneous in terms of design, population, sample size and endpoints, in most cases a significant association was found between obesity and the risk of progressing to severe COVID-19 illness, intensive care unit admission and/or death. We can hence conclude that an increased body mass index shall be considered a negative prognostic factor in patients with COVID-19, and more aggressive prevention or treatment shall hence be reserved to overweight and/or obese patients.

Obesity augments the disease burden in COVID‐19: Updated data from an umbrella review

“…Using the AMSTAR-2 appraisal tool to judge the methodological quality, 25 14,[17][18][19][20][21][24][25][26]28,30,32,33,35,37,[41][42][43][44][45][46][47][48][49][50] of the 37 studies were evaluated as 'Low'or 'Critically low'-quality studies; 15 14,[17][18][19][20][21][24][25][26]28,30,32,33,35,37 and 10, [41][42][43][44][45][46][47][48][49][50] respectively (Table S2). The individual results of the AMSTAR-2 study quality assessment are...…”

“…Using the AMSTAR‐2 appraisal tool to judge the methodological quality, 25 14,17–21,24–26,28,30,32,33,35,37,41–50 of the 37 studies were evaluated as ‘Low’‐ or ‘Critically low’‐quality studies; 15 14,17–21,24–26,28,30,32,33,35,37 and 10, 41–50 respectively (Table S2). The individual results of the AMSTAR‐2 study quality assessment are shown in Table S3.…”

“…Using the AMSTAR‐2 appraisal tool to judge the methodological quality, 25 14 , 17 , 18 , 19 , 20 , 21 , 24 , 25 , 26 , 28 , 30 , 32 , 33 , 35 , 37 , 41 , 42 , 43 , 44 , 45 , 46 , 47 , 48 , 49 , 50 of the 37 studies were evaluated as ‘Low’‐ or ‘Critically low’‐quality studies; 15 14 , 17 , 18 , 19 , 20 , 21 , 24 , 25 , 26 , 28 , 30 , 32 , 33 , 35 , 37 and 10, 41 , 42 , 43 , 44 , 45 , 46 , 47 , 48 , 49 , 50 respectively (Table S2 ). The individual results of the AMSTAR‐2 study quality assessment ar...…”

“…38,39 Third, no study restricted the group of reference to individuals with Lastly, the study quality among the systematic reviews varied greatly according to AMSTAR-2. The key limitation was the lack of a prespecified protocol before conducting the study 17,18,20,21,[24][25][26]28,30,32,35,[41][42][43][44][45]47,48,50 (Item no. 2).…”

Causas de fallecimiento en pacientes con COVID-19 en la Ciudad de México

“…Obesity is the most frequent previous health condition among COVID-19 patients and has a high proportion of deaths to cases. Onorato et al (2020) found four studies regarding the effect of obesity on mortality of COVID-19 patients in the United States and the United Kingdom, all of them concluding that obesity is related to the risk of death.…”