Weight and Covid risk
The scary aspect of Covid is the uncertainty of who will make it alive. Hence, despite the mortality rate of only 1.6% and recovery rate of over 90% that appear on media screens one cannot be sure on which side an individual might fall.
Scientists and doctors have been trying to understand the risk factors or features that might make a person more susceptible. Broadly referred to as co-morbities, they include age (elderly), hypertension, diabetes, heart disease, kidney disease, asthma, cancers and such others.
A relatively new addition to the list has been obesity. Scientists, initially in the USA and thereafter in UK, noticed that those who weighed more than normal showed a three times higher chance, if infected, of sliding down to severe or critical Covid, and even dying, compared with their fit or thinner counterparts.
Obesity apart from holding hands with hypertension, diabetes and fatty liver, makes for a significant risk by itself. Intensivists have, far too often, noticed that plump flabby individual who presented with a mild infection, slither down to a severe or critical state, and often not been able to make it. The underlying mechanism(s) have to be with restricted movements of chest muscles and ventilation that obese are prone to, but also to increased ACE2receptor sites from where the virus enters and higher inflammatory markers that whip up the cytokine storm.
In a way, the Covid pandemic dragging on for more than a year, has given us enough time! Some individuals, who had been conscious of their extra weights, took up the opportunity of to get into shape. Many embarked on diet and fitness regimes at home and shed off their extra pounds. One Mr Seth, a senior overweight executive in a multinational firm shed 8 Kg! And there are many such wonderful stories.
Fat can be stubborn to melt and shed, but a combination of diet and exercise usually work in most cases. Restricting intake of calories is a first step, as are special diets or eating methods such as Intermittent fasting. As regards burning the fats which have already accumulated, a long list of indoor fitness regimes that are now available, from yoga to weights to indoor walks invariably works.
Covid is likely to stay some more months. Every individual with a Body Mass Index of more than 23.5 can reduce TV watching and gorging on junk foods, and cease the opportunity to get into shape. It could help ensure a milder illness should it occur.