UK seeing more deaths compared to France because of Obesity

[Gina1969]

Last 7 Days in UK

21,242 cases - 189 Deaths
26,684 cases - 191 Deaths
21,330 Cases - 241 Deaths
18,803 Cases - 80 Deaths
16,981 Cases - 67 Deaths
16,170 Cases - 150 Deaths
15,650 Cases - 136 deaths

Total of 136,860 cases and 1054 Deaths

France Last 7 Days

41,622 Cases - 162 Deaths
26,676 Cases - 163 Deaths
20,468 Cases - 262 Deaths
13,243 Cases - 146 Deaths
29,837 Cases - 85 Deaths
32,427 Cases - 89 Deaths
25,086 Cases - 179 Deaths

Total 189,359 Cases - 1086 Deaths

So France reported 52,599 more cases than UK whilst preforming significantly fewer tests than the UK but only reported 32 more deaths as a result.

In fact the UK is preforming more than double the number of tests compared to France.

The UK has preformed just under 31 million tests compared to Frances 14 million. Per Million the UK has tested 453,097 with France at 217,125

So if anything France is likely missing more cases than the UK is missing.

So why may fatality rate be higher than the UK.

The Average age in France is 41.2, the UK is younger at 40.5. In fact population structures in both countries is broadly similar.

However when it comes to weight the UK is much much fatter. The 2014 WHO BMI Rank places the UK 40th in Regards to highest BMI with an average national BMI of 27.3. For reference America is 20th at 28.5.

France however comes in 120th with an average BMI of just 25.3.

50% of French Adults are overweight, with 18% obese. In the UK this is 29% with 62% of adults overweight. However among Males this is closer to 70%.

Averaging the national weight (all males and females) the French are 2 stone lighter than the British. 12st 9ibs in Uk, 10st 9ibs in France.

The Obesity Epidemic has left the UK more vulnerable to Covid-19 then other countries and should be treated as the number one public health priority after the epidemic is over.

Also forgot to mention I picked France because they have a similar population size to the UK.

I agree. Population density only explains some of it.

Hopefully when they have to start raise taxes post-pandemic the government could start by taxing crap food with crap ingredients.

I agree junk food needs to be taxed like cigarettes

The number of deaths is rising quickly it is frightening.
I don't think it is obesity. I think it is the countries difference in attitudes towards the virus causing a higher death rate. French citizens have been wearing masks longer.
There lockdown was more organised than the UK.

It would also explain low deaths in places like Japan--although it's likely that previous SARs outbreak has led to some cross immunity too.

I think there's a lot in this theory OP.

Japanese citizens wear masks daily since SARS. They're far more advanced when it comes to viral respiratory infections looking at Taiwan too.

Japanese vitamin d levels are likely to be higher given their diet. I don’t know how ours compare with France.

Maybe, but the number of cases on those days has little to no relation to the number of deaths. Those deaths would have been cases an average of 3 weeks ago, some of them a lot further back than that. So comparing cases and deaths over the last 7 days doesn't make much sense.

Lots of other factors to consider too, not least the age distribution of the cases that led to those deaths.

Remember the obesity strategy they launched before the summer? They pushed it for about a week then shifted the focus to half price burgers instead. There's no doubt the UK is less healthy than other nations.

A couple of months back, Radio 4's More or Less programme had a feature where it looked at how many excess Covid deaths the UK had due to obesity compared to what the deaths figure would have been if we had the same obesity rates as Italy (which apparently has the lowest obesity rates in Europe). It calculated an additional deaths figure which was in the hundreds, but not the thousands.

In fact the UK is preforming more than double the number of tests compared to France.

Is this number of tests or number of people tested? They're not the same thing, not that it detracts from your overall message.

Another important factor if comparing death rates with France is quality of healthcare. Everything I've heard points to France having a better healthcare system with more capacity than the UK. Early treatment for Covid can prevent someone deteriorating to the point that their condition becomes life threatening. At the height of the pandemic in the UK, many people who were very ill with Covid were not getting admitted to hospital. Maybe in France the threshold for how ill you needed to be to get admitted to hospital was lower. That could certainly have a significant impact on death rates.

@ChaChaCha2012

It’s very frustrating because we do not know how many are tested each day. This is very important info kept from the public.

I think it's appalling that the government has not gone on a health drive because of this. I do some people that have used it as a wake up call.