During the last few days of the presidential election cycle, Democratic candidate Joe Biden and his agents in the media and elsewhere are trying to blame President Donald Trump’s COVID-19 deaths. One of the recent tweets I’ve seen compares the death toll in South Korea (461) with the death toll in the United States (more than 232,000).
South Korea has a population of just over 51 million. The population of the United States is 330.5 million. Had everything been equal, South Korea would have lost more than 35,000 in COVID-19.
But obviously they are not equal.South Korea has a mortality rate of only 9 per million, but our mortality rate is 700 Per million people. That’s a phenomenal difference. And while the mortality rate per million is not the highest (all countries with high mortality rates are in South America, with the exception of Belgium), it is still surprisingly high.
The Democrats want to put this at the feet of Donald Trump. But the truth is much more complex, diffuse and personal.
One of the main factors complicating the number of deaths from COVID-19 in the United States is obesity. Trust for America’s Health recently published a report titled “The State of Obesity 2020.” Between 2017 and 2018, 42% of American adults were obese, according to data available from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Not just overweight-obesity. Nine percent were “severe” obese. (How does it compare to the rest of the world? The United States has the 12th highest obesity rate among 191 countries. By comparison, South Korea is the 183rd and only 4.7% of the population is obese.)
This is the highest number ever recorded and is part of a disturbing trend. Not only is obesity in adults increasing, but obesity levels in children and adolescents are also increasing. The Global Pediatric Health Journal calls adolescent obesity an “epidemic” and reports that children’s obesity has doubled. triple Adolescence since 1990.
Obesity is closely associated with other serious health problems, including asthma, sleep apnea, arthritis, gout, high blood pressure (high blood pressure), heart attack, stroke, type 2 diabetes, and even respiratory problems such as certain cancers. These numbers are very important because they are related to. The accuracy of human obesity is painful and immeasurable.But the financial sacrifice is Can be measured. The CDC also estimates obesity-related medical costs at $ 147 billion. Every year..
Weight problems in the United States and related disorders also play a major role in the case fatality rate of COVID-19 in the United States. According to a misunderstood CDC report, 94% of deaths from COVID-19 occur in individuals with one or more comorbidities (the serious health problems that cause death). Some of those comorbidities (especially pneumonia) were caused by COVID-19 itself. However, many other viral infections were already present, including heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, and renal failure. COVID-19 gave the final blow.
Just last month, Science magazine summarized the results of some recent studies. One published by the Obesity Reviews Journal surveyed the medical history of nearly 400,000 patients, and obese people infected with COVID-19 were “113% higher and 74% more likely than healthy weight people. There is a 48% increased chance of being admitted to the ICU and dying. ”A study conducted by Genentech surveyed 17,000 inpatient COVID patients. Almost 80% were overweight or obese.
Obesity factors are also increasingly being used to explain the impact of COVID-19 on certain segments of the US population. As an example, younger people tend to be less affected by COVID-19 than older people, but more than 60% of those killed by COVID-19 under the age of 45 were obese. Similarly, ethnic or racially identified obesity rates are associated with mortality, but are disproportionate to their share of the US population. Non-Hispanic blacks make up 13% of the US population, but COVID-19 mortality is higher than any other group, twice that of whites and Asians. The next highest mortality group is indigenous peoples (less than 1% of the population), followed by Latin Americans (only 16.7% of the population). Asian Americans have the lowest mortality rate from COVID-19.
Correlation is not causal, but these results closely track obesity rates. Non-Hispanic blacks have the highest obesity rate in the United States (49.6%), followed by Native Americans (48.1%), Hispanics (44.8%), and non-Hispanic whites (42.2%). The percentage of non-Hispanic Asians is the lowest (17.4%).
Like many others these days, the important information contained in this data is buried in political controversy and pointing. This is a serious disadvantage to the American people. No, obesity does not explain all COVID-19 deaths, but more than all deaths from a heart attack, stroke, or pneumonia in a “normal” year. But if we want to address the real reason we are suffering more than many other parts of the world, we need to go beyond politics and develop policies that drive real lifestyle change. There is.
No matter who is elected president next week, the country needs to take the health of its people seriously. At all levels, our government must make reducing obesity in Americans a top public health priority.
