Risk of obesity (RO) score – a new proposal for obesity staging

ABSTRACT

Obesity is a multisystem chronic disease which has reached epidemic/pandemic proportions worldwide and poses serious medical and societal challenges. Very soon after the COVID-19 outbreak in March 2020, it became clear that obesity is one of the main risk factors for severe forms of SARS-CoV-2 infections and for mortality due to COVID. The collision of the two pandemics – obesity and COVID-19, created the opportunity to revisit the national, regional, and global plans to tackle obesity and was a powerful driver for various organizations to shed a stronger light on obesity problem. On the other hand, experts in the field of obesity raised the idea that in order to reduce the burden of adiposity-related comorbidities, there is a need for a better alignment between staging systems taking into account the presence and severity of comorbidities and weight loss treatment guidelines which still use body mass index (BMI) thresholds to recommend strategies choice. In line with these recommendations, we propose a new obesity staging system, the risk of obesity (RO) score, based on three criteria anthropometric, the burden of diseases and cardiovascular risk. Its utility in clinical practice will be further tested.