Obesity and its implications for COVID-19 pandemic in South Africa.

Abstract

Obesity is a non-communicable disease associated with variety of a comorbidities, which includes: (1) metabolic diseases: type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM), metabolic associated fatty liver disease (non-alcoholic fatty liver disease [NAFLD] or non-alcoholic steatohepatitis [NASH]), dyslipidaemia and chronic inflammation, (2) respiratory diseases: chronic hypoventilation, sleep apnoea, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and (3) cardiovascular diseases: hypertension, pulmonary embolism and coronary heart disease.2,3,4,5 Age < 60 years and co-morbidities linked to obesity are powerful predictors of hospitalisation length of stay, intensive care unit (ICU) admissions, higher morbidity and disease progression because of acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (COVID-19), despite correcting for comorbidities.3,4,5,6