Flu Plus Obesity Increase Risk of Death Three-fold:

Obese people face nearly three-fold higher odds of dying from a flu infection and should be given priority access to flu shots, according to the authors of a new study. They found that the risk of dying increases at a BMI of 30 or greater.  The researchers analyzed 239 studies published between 1918 and 2011 involving more than 610,000 people. Overall, the team found that obesity “is an important risk factor for death with both pandemic and seasonal influenza, and that the evidence implicating obesity was stronger than many of the traditional risk factors. BMJ Aug. 2013