BMI over 40 increases chances of dying of Covid by 90%

[Worriedmum999]

I’ve just read a new study by PHE that obese people have a 40% increased risk of dying and BMI over 40 is a 90% increase. I was already petrified of catching it as I am massively overweight and not leaving the house at all.

I’ve been overweight all my life and my BMI is now 46! I’m in such a state. I don’t want to leave my 2 young children. I need to do this but with 30 years of failed diets behind me I honestly don’t know where to start

@Bakewell79 thank you so much, I will get my arse over there. I was looking under the Weight Loss topic!

I might join that thread too if it’s ok?

Start small
Don’t set yourself unachievable goals
Try small changes first
Then build on them
Take each day at a time
For example if your weakness is snacks - try setting a goal of no snacks for 24 hours

But if your chances are 0.03 percent in the first place it’s now .057 - not exactly earth shattering for the relatively young

I have bmi 52 and had covid - and I’ve had worse colds

If it helps I have set myself a challenge of a certain number of steps 3 times a week. My job is mainly desk bound. Now I have met that, I am aiming for 30 active minutes three times a week. When I am regularly doing X steps 3 times a week and 30 active minutes three times a week I will increase my step challenge on my device and so on. If ai set myself the challenge of a 5k a week I would not meet it so I started small.

I think the relationship between obesity and health is complex. I'm obese and I don't think as some people do it has no impact on health. But also I think it is too simplistic (and not researched enough) to say correlation is causation. There will be many other factors such as other health conditions at play too.
Remember it's still a small risk. Also becoming more active is the most important thing you can do even if you don't lose weight from being more active it will help your overall health.

If you want to lose weight long term think about how you can do that. As often those if us who are obese have many attempts at weight loss which fail.

@HeIenaDove

Posted by *@ToffeeYoghurt* a while ago.

A guide for Boris re tackling obesity.
Ensuring people have proper housing with access to proper cooking facilities and storage.
Enough money (be it through employment, pension, or benefits) to afford healthy fresh food (no food banks).
An overhauled NHS so people are no longer (as they were pre pandemic) left waiting months on end for treatment (suffering prolonged mobility issues as a consequence).
Also good mental health provision including help and support for comfort eating, and looking again at the pros and cons of the different mental health drugs.
In some cases, certainly when its long-term use, it's perhaps preferable to prescribe the out of fashion benzodiazepines rather than the modern anti depressants that often cause weight gain.
Oh and we'd need to stop dismissing patients symptoms, especially women, as mental health or hormones. I've heard several people talk about this sort of experience when they had undiagnosed thyroid conditions (which can lead to weight gain).
Boris- over to you!!

Benzodiazepines to reduce obesity?! I've heard smoking also helps curb appetite...

@HeIenaDove

Posted by *@ToffeeYoghurt* a while ago.

A guide for Boris re tackling obesity.
Ensuring people have proper housing with access to proper cooking facilities and storage.
Enough money (be it through employment, pension, or benefits) to afford healthy fresh food (no food banks).
An overhauled NHS so people are no longer (as they were pre pandemic) left waiting months on end for treatment (suffering prolonged mobility issues as a consequence).
Also good mental health provision including help and support for comfort eating, and looking again at the pros and cons of the different mental health drugs.
In some cases, certainly when its long-term use, it's perhaps preferable to prescribe the out of fashion benzodiazepines rather than the modern anti depressants that often cause weight gain.
Oh and we'd need to stop dismissing patients symptoms, especially women, as mental health or hormones. I've heard several people talk about this sort of experience when they had undiagnosed thyroid conditions (which can lead to weight gain).
Boris- over to you!!

Absolutely with bells on!!!!

The one in my circumstance is mental heath and hormonal issues. Which I still am working on. But I couldn't agree more.

Also there are often awful threads on here about weight loss so it's been nice to see positive replies.

My BMI is 40. I've just joined SlimmingWorld online and got a Fitbit. I'm starting with a walk every day even if only for 20 minutes and my husband is overweight so doing slimming world too. I find it hard as I've been over weight sine I was 17. I also find it hard doing all the cooking and planning but I've got to to do it. My teenager likes cooking so is going to choose a recipe a week to cook (she's not overweight). My daughter encourages me and wants to do a YouTube fitnesses class with me, maybe you could try this?

I don’t know if this is any good to you but it’s really been helping me.
I’ve downloaded a fasting app called Zero. I keep setting myself 16 hour fasts overnight. This means I stop eating at 7pm then eat breakfast at 11pm. After breakfast, I set myself a 4hr fast so I wait 4hrs for lunch.
This really helps me to minimise snacking.
The other bonus of this is that I fill in the time between meals actually doing stuff instead of mindlessly snacking all day and sitting on my butt. I need to so I can distract myself from food!
I’m more productive, I spend time doing stuff with the dcs and doing stuff for myself. I take the dcs out and play with them.
I exercise, read books and have even painted a picture.
It just feels more positive all around.

I believe that the risk of dying doubles with every 7 years of age. So, if you are obese and 25, you have the same risk of dying as someone who is 32 and slim.

Does that help?

The worst thing for weight gain is sitting at home with no routine. Lockdown and staying in lockdown won’t help with loosing weight. You need to get up and out every day. Walk 20 mins before you eat breakfast, lunch and dinner, only eat fruit and veg for snacking on, cut your portion sizes to half.

Sadly I’m 43 so probably my risk is much higher being so fat as well

I'm 44 and had a mild case and since recovered

This is being handled exactly like covid was at the start, by trying to convince people if you catch it you will die

now they are trying to say if you are obese, you will die

That is not the case at all

Oh OP, I am right there with you. Slightly older, though. The thing I am holding on to is that my risk is the same as a slim man my age and no one is suggesting men need to stay in for the foreseeable. I refuse to use the word diet because I will just start stuffing my face but I have stopped snacking on anything other than fruit, no bread and no second helpings. Those are my first goals and felt sensible and manageable. My waist bands are more loose and I feel less bloated so my next stage is a smaller carb portion at evening meals and more veg and salad to fill the plate. I would say we eat well generally - my issue is too much generally and not enough exercise. After the carb portion control, my aim is to never do less than 10,000 steps a day. One thing at a time....

OP - I think there are two things to get a grip with: the first deciding you are going to diet/exercise to improve your overall health (forget coronavirus, just your health generally) and the second to recognise that in relation to corona, even 80 year olds with several underlying conditions are more likely than not to survive corona. Any weight you can lose is going to have a positive impact so make some small changes today!

I need to get a grip too! Lost 2 stone prior to lockdown and I know i've put it back on again. I have no excuse not to exercise at home - good treadmill and aerobics set, just bloody lazy.

I follow the Keto diet when my willpower allows and it makes a huge difference to the way I feel. For me, at almost 50, it's the only way my body will give up the fat - by stop eating carbs (aka sugar).

I need to get with the plan and get back on the wagon. Happy to buddy up with someone :-)

Hope everyone had a good day today😊 I'm in a week workplace hustle on Fitbit so that's focusing my mind on the steps, done 21,000 today which is the most I've done during the lockdown period. Eaten just under 1500cals today and according to Fitbit burnt 1300 cals so chilling for the rest of the day. Good luck to everyone for the rest of the day! We can do it!!

Oops wrong thread

Your chance of dying of this are very very small so even increasing them by 90% isn't going to make the risk a big one. By all means try and lose some weight if you can . Be realistic. Try and reduce your BMI to under 40 and them keep it there . Don't try and make it a BMI of 25. That can't happen in time but I went from a BMI of 41 to 36 in a couple of.montts a year ago and maintained it since. You can achieve that . Aim for a realistic goal.