Why the study?
Obesity is associated with severe COVID-19 infection and poor outcomes, creating an urgent need for universal measures to reduce SARS-CoV-2 complications in the obese population.
This review highlights the increased risk of severe COVID-19 in patients with obesity and emphasizes the need for obesity prevention and management to mitigate pandemic impacts.
May heighten COVID-19 severity in obesity; leaves open targeted interventions and mechanisms.
Obesity is a principle causative factor of various metabolic dysfunctions, chronic inflammation, and multi-organ impairment. The global epidemic of obesity has constituted the greatest threat to global health. Emerging evidence has associated obesity with an increased risk of severe infection and poor outcomes from coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). During current COVID-19 pandemic, the interaction between COVID-19 and obesity has exaggerated the disease burden of obesity more than ever before. Thus, there is an urgent need for consideration of universal measures to reduce the risk of complications and severe illness from severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) in obesity population. In this review, we first summarized the clinical evidence on the effect of obesity on susceptibility, severity, and prognosis of COVID-19. Then we discussed and the underlying mechanisms, including respiratory pathophysiology of obesity, dysregulated inflammation, upregulated angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2) expression, hyperglycemia, and adipokines. Finally, we proposed recommendations on how to reduce the spread and pandemic of SARS-CoV-2 infection by prevention and treatment of obesity.
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Yang et al. (2023) studied this question.
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