Skip to main content

Will COVID-19 vaccines work for those with obesity?

The disturbing news linking chronic disease with much higher COVID-19 risks continues: any future COVID-19 vaccine could be much less effective among the >107M Americans who are obese.  >40% of adult Americans are obese, including ~10% of teens & adults with severe obesity.

We already know that people of color are at much higher risk of being infected, hospitalized & dying from the novel coronavirus.  Closely related to this, African-, Native-, & Latino-Americans are also much more likely to be obese & have other underlying chronic conditions.  

Those hoping that vaccines could help reduce these disparities will be disappointed.  But we should have known better: for example, the flu vaccine is much less effective among people with obesity. In addition, thanks to past neglect & abuse of minority populations by those in power, non-whites are distrustful of government & less likely to take a COVID-19 vaccine, even if it is free. 

The bottom line: many political leaders have demonstrated little or no concern for communities of color & lower-incomes, now or in the past. They have ignored prevention policies & programs to reduce inactivity & unhealthy nutrition that were very effective in reducing smoking, and which would greatly reduce obesity, diabetes, heart disease & other chronic conditions. These leaders will need a sustained, compelling combination of evidence & pressure to shift their focus.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Citizen-ready civics: the powerful synergy of knowledge plus engagement

Boy, am I an infrequent blogger!  I do want to assure you, though, that I am alive and working on our focus areas.  In particular, there is a window of opportunity opening in the "life-ready" area in Arizona.   The Arizona Department of Health Services has recently determined, after a comprehensive statewide review process, that obesity is the number one health issue facing Arizona.  Other preventable chronic conditions such as heart disease and diabetes were also identified as major AZ health issues. Furthermore, we already know that four of the five root causes of the vast majority of these conditions are unhealthy nutrition, lack of physical activity, smoking, and excess drinking.  (Genetics plays a role as well, but healthy behavior can often trump genetics.)   At the same time, a number of organizations and individuals are frustrated by the increasing narrowing of our public K-12 education, and the dire consequences of downplaying social studies and health educ
Post a Comment
Read more

Urban food myth #1: it costs more to eat healthy than to eat fast food

I get so tired of hearing this: "It costs less to buy a burger from McDonald's that to eat healthy food from the supermarket." "Low-income families just buy processed food, they don't cook their own food anymore." That always sounded questionable.  Here is a study showing in great detail that fast food is much more expensive than healthy food bought at the supermarket . Also, it turns out that the vast majority of meals eaten by low-income families are prepared at home: Blisard N, Stewart H. How low-income households allocate their food budget relative to the cost of the Thrifty Food Plan. Economic research report, United States. Washington, DC: Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service, 2006;20. What is true is that buying healthy vs. unhealthy foods can cost $1.50/person/day more, at retail prices.  However, when health cost consequences are factored in, unhealthy foods cost twice as much .
2 comments
Read more

Health "benefits"?: Oh well...

We meet them all the time:  people trapped in their job, in order to keep their health benefits.   We need a study on the negative impact on entrepreneurship and the economy from people health-handcuffed to their current jobs.  From my limited anecdoctal evidence, the costs are astronomical.   Two-income families have made the labor market much more geographically immobile, and now health insurance is exacerbating the job-jail. Modern Healthcare just summarized results of a new Peterson-Kaiser study  on employer health insurance and the actual cost to employee families, of the combination of employee share of premiums plus employee out-of-pocket health costs. Employers keep shifting more and more health costs to employees. The only good news is that employers are still paying a (fast-shrinking) % of premiums--so health costs are still cheaper than being self-employed.  [Also, if we end up back in the uncovered pre-existing conditions bad-old-days again, expensive employer heal
1 comment
Read more