RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN OBESITY AND THE COVID 19 PANDEMIC: A LITERATURE REVIEW (Atena Editora)

Abstract

In the first 6 months of human exposure to the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome that causes COVID-19, there were over 9,000,000 confirmed infections and nearly 500,000 deaths worldwide. As of November 13, 2021, it is estimated that there were over 250 million confirmed cases of COVID-19 and over 5 million deaths. From another perspective, the prevalence of obesity has recently increased in many developed and developing countries and has doubled in 73 countries since 1980. Emerging studies have also suggested that obesity is associated with worse COVID-19 outcomes, including higher rates of hospitalization and admission to the hospital. Intensive Care Unit, Invasive Mechanical Ventilation and death. However, many studies have not reproduced these findings. Therefore, it is uncertain whether obesity is indeed associated with worse COVID-19 outcomes compared to non-obese individuals. The present study aimed to clarify the relationship between obesity and the severity of COVID-19. To investigate this, we will conduct a systematic search of Web of Science, PubMed, SciELO, Scopus, and Google Scholar on December 3, 2021 to identify all published studies that report COVID-19 comorbidities or outcomes during the pandemic months. expected to find cohort studies and randomized clinical trials. Furthermore, it is expected to analyze that obese patients are more likely than non-obese patients to have severe disease, develop SARS, require hospitalization, be admitted to the ICU or require IMV. Surprisingly, however, it can be seen that obesity was not associated with an increased risk of death from COVID-19.