What your doctor is reading on Medscape.com:

APRIL 16, 2020 -- It is becoming increasingly clear that obesity is one of the biggest risk factors for severe COVID-19 disease, particularly among younger patients.

Newly published data from New York show that among those under 60, obesity was twice as likely to result in hospitalization for COVID-19 and also significantly increased the likelihood that a person would end up in intensive care.

"Obesity [in people < 60 years] appears to be a previously unrecognized risk factor for hospital admission and need for critical care. This has important and practical implications when nearly 40% of adults in the US are obese with a body mass index [BMI] of ≥ 30," write Jennifer Lighter, MD, NYU School of Medicine/NYU Langone Health, and colleagues in their research letter published online April 9 in Clinical Infectious Diseases.

Similar findings in a preprint publication, yet to be peer reviewed, from another New York hospital show that, with the exception of older age, obesity (BMI > 40 kg/m2) had the strongest association with hospitalization for COVID-19, increasing the risk more than sixfold.

Meanwhile, a new French study shows a high frequency of obesity among patients admitted to one intensive care unit for COVID-19; furthermore, disease severity increased with increasing BMI.

One of the authors told Medscape Medical News that many of the presenting patients were younger, with their only risk factor being obesity.

"Patients with obesity should avoid any COVID-19 contamination by enforcing all prevention measures during the current pandemic," say the authors, led by Arthur Simonnet, MD, Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Lille, France.

They also stress COVID-19 patients "with severe obesity should be monitored more closely."

Those With Obesity Are Young and Become Very Sick, Very Quickly

Coauthor of the French article, published online April 9 in Obesity, François Pattou, MD, PhD, told Medscape Medical News that when patients with COVID-19 began to arrive at their intensive care unit in Lille there were young patients who did not have any other comorbidities.

"They were just obese," he observed, adding that they seemed "to have a very specific disease, something different" from that seen before, with patients becoming very sick, very quickly.