Are Patients Suffering from Severe Obesity Getting a Raw Deal During COVID-19 Pandemic?
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LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Are Patients Suffering from Severe Obesity Getting a Raw Deal During COVID-19 Pandemic? Aparna Govil Bhasker 1
&
Jan Willem Greve 2,3
# Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2020
COVID-19 pandemic has brought bariatric and metabolic surgery (BMS) to a halt world over and has pushed the care of patients suffering from obesity to a complete backburner. As associations and organizations across the world work towards rationing healthcare, patients suffering from obesity are constantly finding themselves at the bottom of every priority list and experiencing increased levels of bias. Like everyone else, social distancing norms in most countries have forced patients suffering from obesity to stay indoors. This has led to immense stress and uncertainty in the lives of individuals suffering from obesity. It has made them more vulnerable to over-eating and sedentary lifestyle, thus predisposing them to further weight gain. Currently, social media is flooded with weight-based memes and weight stigmatizing content. Thus, further reinforcing the bias that individuals suffering from obesity may be lazy and less active and have less will-power [1], internalization of these weightbiased attitudes in media portrayals has been shown to cause adverse effects on psychological health, leading to more depression and anxiety, low self-esteem, body image issues, and disordered eating [2]. Patients suffering from obesity may also be stigmatized when they avail healthcare services for COVID-19. Higher weight may mean utilizing more healthcare resources in terms of medicines and manpower. Many healthcare providers are * Aparna Govil Bhasker [email protected] Jan Willem Greve [email protected] 1
Global Hospital, Mumbai; Apollo Group of Hospitals, Mumbai, Mumbai 4000058, India
2
Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery, Department of Surgery, Zuyderland Medical Center, Heerlen, the Netherlands
3
Research School NUTRIM, Department of Surgery, Maastricht University Medical Center, Maastricht, the Netherlands
known to foster negative attitudes against people with obesity [3]. It can be expected that these stereotypes may extend further during this pandemic and lead to more resentment towards these patients. This stigma may impact the quality of care provided and lead to unfavourable outcomes in this group of patients. The incoming economic downturn will also lead to more consumption of unhealthy foods as it is cheaper. This will lead to further increase in obesity prevalence especially in weaker sections of the society. There are also an increasing number of reports that have linked obesity as a risk factor for developing more severe illness of COVID-19 and related mortality [4–6]. Obesity is an underlying factor for type 2 diabetes, hypertension, cardiovascular disease, renal disease, and venous thromboembolism and has a detrimental effect on lung function. A proinflammatory state coupled with malnutrition may lead to impaired immune response in patients suffering from obesity and increased
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