Can Low Carb Decrease Risk of Serious Illness from COVID-19?
Written by: April Smith
Obesity and Diabetes Are Major Risk Factors for Serious COVID-19 Illness
As of May 10, 2020, over 80, 653 deaths from COVID-19 (novel Coronavirus) had been confirmed in the US. Due to lack of accurate reporting, there is almost no doubt that many more have died.
According to the CDC, major risk factors for developing serious illness from COVID-19 include obesity and diabetes. According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), Obesity and diabetes are right up there in the list with age above 65, compromised immunity (such as from HIV or cancer treatment), liver and kidney disease. (1) Obesity and diabetes - diseases caused by the food we eat - are accomplices to the greatest killer of our time, COVID-19.
A new study conducted on behalf of Great Britain’s National Health Service found uncontrolled diabetes to be a major risk factor for serious death from COVID-19.(2) The Rt. Honorable Matt Hancock, Secretary of State for Health and Social Care of Great Britain, declared a War on Obesity as a shocking third of COVID-19 deaths were linked to obesity.(3) Secretary Hancock said,
"We are determined to tackle the problem of obesity, and I am looking very closely at evidence it can worsen the effects of coronavirus. "I'm convinced we need to reverse obesity rates to make our NHS fit for the future, and I look forward to working with the Prime Minister to meet our goal."
British Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, spent a week in the ICU with COVID-19, as people speculated that his weight could have been a causal factor in the severity of his illness.(2)
According to the British Newspaper Express (The Daily Express and Sunday Express), “Health campaigners are now demanding a public inquiry into Britain's fatal obsession with junk food and sugar.”
42.4% of Americans were obese in 2017-2018 according to the CDC.(4) That’s not just a few pounds heavy or overweight: obesity is defined as 20% or more above ideal weight. Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, the US already spent $147 billion dollars on obesity related healthcare costs. (5) How much more are we spending during the pandemic due to obesity? How many people are in hospitals, on ventilators, or dying, whose illness was worsened by their weight?
Diabetes is also a major risk factor for severe COVID-19 illness. The CDC says, “More than 34 million Americans have diabetes (about 1 in 10), and approximately 90-95% of them have type 2 diabetes.”(4) Type 2 diabetes is the kind of diabetes you weren’t born with. It develops over time, and obesity is it’s proximate cause.
Low Fat Diets: The (Failed) Usual Prescription
When you go to the doctor and have obesity and/or Type 2 diabetes, you’re usually told to eat a “healthy” or “balanced” diet. This diet supposedly consists of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, low fat or nonfat dairy and lean meats, and unsaturated (not animal) fats. While people with obesity and/or diabetes try to follow these guidelines, rates of obesity continue to rise. Why?
Option 1 is that people simply aren’t sticking to the “diet.” They’re sneaking in high fat foods, such as a steak or glass of whole milk, and remaining obese.
Option 2 is that the diet prescribed doesn’t actually lead to weight loss, at least not without uncomfortable levels of calorie restriction. Since protein and fat are the biggest satisfiers of hunger, denying them will likely cause more, not less hunger.
High carbohydrate foods also perpetuate the cycle of blood sugar rushes and drops: after a meal, blood sugar increases quickly. Then comes the sugar drop, along with food, especially sugar, cravings. Insulin resistance and low glucose tolerance is characterized by this up and down cycle, leading to overeating and often diabetes.
Certainly, the mass production of fat-free or low fat but high carb foods has done nothing to decrease American rates of obesity or diabetes.
Low Carbohydrate Diets Combat Obesity and Diabetes
At the Banting Symposium in 1988, Dr. Gerald Reaven gave a lecture in which he described how central obesity (being “apple shaped”), diabetes, and obesity had two things in common: insulin resistance and low glucose tolerance.(3) Dr. Reaven called this “Syndrome X,” but is now commonly called “Metabolic Syndrome.” Low carbohydrate diets lower insulin levels, and avoid the insulin spikes that cause “sugar highs” and crashes.
A 2018 paper by Dr. Sarah Hallberg and colleagues at Ohio University entitled “Effectiveness and Safety of a Novel Care Model for the Management of Type 2 Diabetes at 1 Year: An Open-Label, Non-Randomized, Controlled Study” showed that of over 300 patients with Type 2 diabetes who were put on a ketogenic (very low carbohydrate) diet, 94% were able to eliminate or reduce the use of artificial insulin. These patients also lowered their HbA1C (a measurement of blood sugar levels over time) from 7.6% to 6.3% and lowered their body weight by 12%.(6)
Why Don’t Doctors Recommend that Obesity and Diabetes Patients
Try Low Carb?
The US nutritional establishment has been convinced that fat is the cause of obesity and heart disease. You’ve probably heard the phrase, “Fat makes you fat,” especially if you were around for the low fat obsessed 1980s and 1990s. Arteriosclerosis plaques (the things that clog blood vessels leading to the heart) have fat in them, but that doesn’t mean that fat is the cause of heart disease. In fact, the idea that fat causes heart disease and obesity hasn’t been proven in all the tests of the Diet Heart Hypothesis over the last 30 years.
The history of the Diet Heart Hypothesis is longer than the scope of this post, but you can read more about it here, and about Dr. Feinman’s long term battle to bring attention to the importance of low carbohydrate diets as a front line defense against diabetes and obesity here.(7)
Front Line Defense Against Serious Illness From COVID-19
Diabetes and obesity have been slowly killing large portions of the American population for decades. Now, with the COVID-19 pandemic, these diseases are killing quickly. Isn’t it time that healthcare professionals gave patients potentially life-saving information on how to end obesity and better control or even cure diabetes?
The current crisis makes it more clear than ever that the traditional, low fat approach to obesity and diabetes has failed. As the number and proportion of American deaths surpass those of countries where obesity rates are lower, (Italy has a 19.9% obesity rate, France weighs in at 21.6% obese (8), and Spain’s obesity rate is 26.5% (9) - while the US obesity rate is approaching 40%) (10), we must consider low carbohydrate diets as a frontline defense in the fight against COVID-19.(8,9,10)
References:
1. 3. Centers for Disease Control: People who are at higher risk for severe illness.
https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/need-extra-precautions/people-at-higher-risk.html
2. OpenSAFELY: factors associated with COVID-19-related hospital death in the linked electronic health records of 17 million adult NHS patients.
The OpenSAFELY Collaborative, Elizabeth Williamson, Alex J Walker, Krishnan J Bhaskaran, Seb Bacon, Chris Bates, Caroline E Morton, Helen J Curtis, Amir Mehrkar, David Evans, Peter Inglesby, Jonathan Cockburn, Helen I Mcdonald, Brian MacKenna, Laurie Tomlinson, Ian J Douglas, Christopher T Rentsch, Rohini Mathur,Angel Wong, Richard Grieve, David Harrison, Harriet Forbes, Anna Schultze, Richard T Croker, John Parry, Frank Hester, Sam Harper, Rafael Perera, Stephen Evans, Liam Smeeth, Ben Goldacre
3. “We must win obesity war for the NHS: Third of COVID-19 deaths linked to diabetes.” (2020) Express (The Daily Express and Sunday Express)
4. Centers for Disease Control: Adult Obesity Facts. https://www.cdc.gov/obesity/data/adult.html
5. Centers for Disease Control: Type 2 Diabetes https://www.cdc.gov/diabetes/basics/type2.html
6. Hallberg SJ, McKenzie AL, Williams PT, Bhanpuri NH, Peters AL, Campbell WW, Hazbun TL, Volk BM, McCarter JP, Phinney SD, Volek JS. (2018) Effectiveness and Safety of a Novel Care Model for the Management of Type 2 Diabetes at 1 Year: An Open-Label, Non-Randomized, Controlled Study. Diabetes Therapy: Research, treatment and education of diabetes and related disorders.
7. Smith, A. (2018) 2018: The Year of Low Carb. Cronometer.
8. Global Obesity Rates. ProCon.org. https://obesity.procon.org/global-obesity-levels/
9. Henry, TA. (November 26, 2020) “Adult Obesity Rates Rise in 6 States, Exceed 35 in 7.
10.World Health Organization: Spain. http://www.euro.who.int/__data/assets/pdf_file/0020/243326/Spain-WHO-Country-Profile.pdf?ua=1
11. Henry, TA (2018) “Adult Obesity Rates Rise in 6 States, Exceed 37% in 7” American Medical Association. https://www.ama-assn.org/delivering-care/public-health/adult-obesity-rates-rise-6-states-exceed-35-7