Obesity Covid link

PEOPLE who are considered obese are twice as likely to have a long hospital stay or die from Covid-19. Swedish researchers studied more than 1000 Covid patients in intensive care to determine the link between body mass index (BMI) and how badly the disease affected them.

Patients with a BMI of 35kg/m2 or more, which falls into the obese range, were likely to suffer for longer or die.

This could be because obesity increases the risk of comorbidities such as type 2 diabetes and hypertension, researchers said. They explained these comorbidities increased the need for ventilators when treating respiratory illnesses like influenza and pneumonia.

Now academics are pushing for BMI to be included in the severity scoring for Covid patients in ICU.