Is it really as simple as eating less?

Since I’ve been writing about Covid for nearly a year now in my Arizona Daily Star columns, I’ve received dozens of emails from anti-vaxxers, anti-maskers and even people who think Covid is a hoax. Thankfully, those latter are few and far between.

Through these emails I’ve learned a number of things, including the negative cost of masking in small children (Pre-K through 3rd), the reason kids shouldn’t mask (but adults should vax), about a Journal of the American Medical Association study showing that masking in children affects their processing of oxygen/carbon dioxide, how other countries’ medical equivalents of our CDC have looked at the data on Covid and kids and said masks for kids under the age of 12 should not be used in schools, and, finally, the risk to children from Covid compared to everything else they do.

My readers seem to be less open to learning from me, especially about the safety of the vaccine for the vast majority of the population and data surrounding the connection between obesity and poor Covid outcomes. For instance, only about 30% of people who’ve been hospitalized or died from Covid have had obesity but readers don’t want to hear it. They just want to yell at me IN ALL CAPS that the health department should be pushing losing weight instead of getting the shot.

And this is why I wrote my latest column on the connection between Covid and obesity. I wasn’t able to include everything in it that I got from interviewing two experts b/c my editors won’t give the entire op-ed space over to me alone, but you’ll get the gist. One thing that couldn’t be included was that people with pre-existing conditions, including obesity, usually do get sicker with Covid than people without those conditions and also, the vaccine doesn’t “take” as well in their bodies. This is why it is paramount that people with comorbidities get their boosters ASAP and why all of us – every single last one – put down our excuses and get off the couch. You don’t even have to lose any weight – as you’ll see if you read my column here, which I certainly hope you do!