splitthis is going to be happy. Her obesity theory was proven correct in NYC. It was found to be the 2nd most important factor for COVID-19 hospitalization risk, behind age. However, it was noted that it was "dwarfed" by age, meaning that an old non-obese person had a far greater chance to be hospitalized than a middle-aged obese person.
Obesity was defined as a BMI of 30 or greater. I fall under that (though not by much), coming in at 29. I would like to see this also studied for BMIs higher than 30 (such as 35+).
Here's an interesting flow chart:
Some interesting findings:
87% of people over 65 who came in to test for COVID-19 were admitted to the hospital (!!), compared to 37% of those under 65.
Those obese and under 65 were still admitted 60% of the time, and 70% of the time if they were obese and over 35 years old!
Only 13% of those tested positive who were aged 20-44 AND non-obese were admitted.
Diabetes was a huge factor, as you'd expect, but especially for males. Men 45+ who were diabetic were admitted 83% of the time, whereas women 45+ with diabetes were only admitted 57% of the time.
Black men also got admitted a lot. Non-obese, non-diabetic black men 45+ who tested positive were admitted 60% of the time, compared to 45% for whites.
These were samples, and not hard percentages from all the NYC hospitals.