[stolenmerch]

I suppose the first thing that might come to mind is the correlation between obesity and serious disease outcome. "Pooled analysis show individuals with obesity were more at risk for COVID-19, >46% higher for hospitalization. >113% higher for ICU, 48% increase in death... The underlying metabolic and inflammatory factors of individuals with obesity also play a considerable role in the manifestation of severe lung diseases. [0] Given that only about 20% of sub-Saharan Africa is overweight compared to nearly 70% of North America [1], I might consider this one factor.

[0] https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/obr.13128

[1] https://ourworldindata.org/obesity

[999900000999]

Obesity is always been one of the main factors in COVID mortality. Really any mortality, for almost every illness being overweight complicates things.

However, it's taboo to outright say that. The Huffington Post runs a regular, "You can be morbidly obese and be perfectly healthy "article. I used to be well over 300 lb, and even now losing weight is one of my primary concerns ( I hover around 240, although when I slack off I'm at 250 again).

[rkk3]

Even if you are morbidly obese from muscle (who are we kidding) that excess weight is still putting unhealthy additional stress on all of your organs