Worried that the Covid vaccine won’t work on obese people

[SoscaredforJan]

So, after the news this morning about AZ trialling a new antibody concoction that is supposed to give immediate protection against Covid I began to research is as my dad is having chemo and has been told that his body might not respond to a vaccine sufficiently.

I could not find where you could sign up for the trial in uk (does anyone know how I can sign him up?) but I did find the sign up for the same trial in America. It recommended it for people with HIV, cancer and obese people.

Obviously I’m trying to get my weight down but it’s a long process and I’m worried that the vaccine I am waiting desperately for will be useless for me. If I wasn’t depressed yesterday I am today.

So my question is does anyone know if they have trialled any of the vaccines on obese people and did they work?

I presume there were obese people in the trial group, but since nothing was released about it not ebign effective, it should work like any other vaccine, in this group?

If it didn't work on obese people they wouldn't be listed as part of priority group 6 for the vaccine

Trials need strict control subjects. It looks to me that they have said no obese people as this is a risk category for the virus.
They need to prove the vaccine first and get it out as fast as possible - they can't do that if a risk group is skewing the data.

The body immune system is the same so it should work with obesity. It might be that they want more trials before vaccinating this group but in the meantime we can start to build herd immunity. I don't know if this has taken place but its prudent for them to get extra data before trying with risk categories.

It'll come around soon enough. I hope the public can help control it behaviourally in the meantime.

AFIAK, obesity has no bearing on your ability to produce antibodies and white blood cells, so why would a vaccination not work?

Chemotherapy can affect your ability to produce white blood cells, that's why a vaccination might be ineffective.

Obesity can make you more ill from Covid as it makes it harder for you to expand your lungs, but that's a completely seperate issue.

There was a documentary called 'Hospital' on the BBC a few weeks back. All about covid. It showed one of the vaccine clinical trials, and some of the recipients they spoke to were visibly extremely obese. As in, obviously BMI 40+. I couldn't tell you which vaccine it was, however.

I know someone (an A&E doctor) who was part of the Oxford trial. He is obese.

Thank you that’s good to know. Now I’m surmising that it’s the obese people in the oxford trial that it didn’t work on as it’s only 62% effective or whatever. However, surely they would have announced that?

I mean this kindly, but you are making a big assumption that has no basis in fact - and worrying disproportionately. There’s no reason to think that the vaccine won’t work on obese people. Try not to worry about this scenario unless it is every announced/proved.

I am obese and had signed up for one of the trials, I had to pull out for reasons unrelated to my size.

The trials for the antibodies as prophylaxis are being run by UCLH but I have no idea how you sign up

www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-55438758

I think you are misunderstanding

Pfizer press release

"In the pivotal study, vaccine efficacy similar to that observed in the overall population was generally consistent among subgroups defined by age, gender, race, ethnicity, obesity, or presence of a comorbidity."

Eur Soc for Obesity
"MODERNA VACCINE WORKS WELL, EVEN WITH SEVERE OBESITY"

Honestly if the vaccine didn’t work on obese people we’d have heard about it by now - that’s a massive group of people that it would exclude - something like 30% of UK adults are obese. It definitely would have gotten reported on.

That’s a huge relief! Thank you! Obviously I will carry on with the January healthy eating though

I think generally vaccines don’t work as well on obese people as they do on those of a healthy weight. Not sure why the COVID one would be any different.
That’s not to say it wont work, just maybe not as well we hope.
Keep trying to lose weight and build your immune system up as much as you can in the meantime.

Great As I thought then. Just feel like giving up to be honest. And seeing as I will probably be forced to send my children back to school in January under threats of fines or losing their place I better just cross my fingers that I don’t die when I inevitably catch it from them. At least that’ll be one less person to vaccinate.

Ive been worried about this. I was wondering if they ought to give a literal double dose (I didn't think it was quite like this...) Or if where my body is knackered it might not work in the right way.

My only hope when I get anxious about it is that it would reduce the severity of it maybe even if it didnt "work". So death less likely!?

Im scared silly of catching it from my kids too. Or them gorwing up thinking they killed mummy :( . We're avoiding all indoor places. Only met one person over xmas (doors open etc and only due to their mental healt). Dont go shopping etc. But its in schools

I know a lot of people who have had covid who are overweight/obese, none of them died, including my 90 year old obese grandmother who has a few underlying health conditions.
Stay positive

@TwilightSkies

I think generally vaccines don’t work as well on obese people as they do on those of a healthy weight. Not sure why the COVID one would be any different. That’s not to say it wont work, just maybe not as well we hope. Keep trying to lose weight and build your immune system up as much as you can in the meantime.

What are you basing this on? Do you have a link or ref?

Stay positive, you can do something about your weight. The two biggest risk factors that you can’t change don’t apply (being old & male).

OP what @SoscaredforJan has neglected to leave out is that it’s all still unknown at the moment. For some other vaccines (e.g. flu) it has been shown to be marginally less effective in obese people; however “marginally less effective” does NOT equal “doesn’t work at all”.

It still gives a very good coverage - otherwise why would the NHS bother spending money on it to vaccinate obese people?

If the COVID vaccine is similar then it will be along the same lines - marginally less effective. So still works in the vast majority of cases. Most of the higher risk lies with the co-morbidities associated with obesity (diabetes etc impact on the immune system)

I say this gently and as a fellow obese person - I think you may need to talk to a doctor about how you’re feeling. It’s not normal to Spiral like this - obesity comes with a wide range of health risks (stroke, diabetes, heart health). If you don’t fixate on those then why should you fixate on COVID? Yes, absolutely focus on losing weight and getting healthier but you need to work on your mental health and resilience as well.

Sorry that tag was meant to be @TwilightSkies

Because the othwr health risks aren't likely to kill me within 2 weeks of contact.