1. Obesity and COVID-19: what makes obese host so vulnerable?
- Author
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Mohammad, Sameer, Aziz, Rafia, Al Mahri, Saeed, Malik, Shuja Shafi, Haji, Esraa, Khan, Altaf Husain, Khatlani, Tanvir Saleem, and Bouchama, Abderrezak
- Subjects
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COVID-19 , *COVID-19 pandemic , *SARS-CoV-2 , *CARDIOVASCULAR diseases , *OLDER patients , *OBESITY , *TYPE 2 diabetes - Abstract
The disease (COVID-19) novel coronavirus pandemic has so far infected millions resulting in the death of over a million people as of Oct 2020. More than 90% of those infected with COVID-19 show mild or no symptoms but the rest of the infected cases show severe symptoms resulting in significant mortality. Age has emerged as a major factor to predict the severity of the disease and mortality rates are significantly higher in elderly patients. Besides, patients with underlying conditions like Type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, hypertension, and cancer have an increased risk of severe disease and death due to COVID-19 infection. Obesity has emerged as a novel risk factor for hospitalization and death due to COVID-19. Several independent studies have observed that people with obesity are at a greater risk of severe disease and death due to COVID-19. Here we review the published data related to obesity and overweight to assess the possible risk and outcome in Covid-19 patients based on their body weight. Besides, we explore how the obese host provides a unique microenvironment for disease pathogenesis, resulting in increased severity of the disease and poor outcome. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 2021
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