The Lockdown Effects on a Pediatric Obese Population in the COVID-19 Era

Background: The social consequences of COVID-19 pandemic are universally known. In particular, the pediatric population is dealing with a radical lifestyle change. For some risk categories, such as overweight or obese children, the impact of home confinement has been greater than for others. The increased sedentary life, the wrong diet and social distancing have stopped the chance of losing weight. The aims of this study were to analyse the impact of COVID-19 lockdown on the behavior changes in a obese pediatric population and to explore the correlation between the new lifestyle and the level of parental instruction.

Methods: Data show features of 40 obese and overweight pediatric patients of our Clinic in Messina (Italy). We evaluated weight, height, BMI and other biochemical parameters: total cholesterol, HDL, LDL, triglyceride, transaminases, glycemia and insulinemia. After the lockdown, we contacted all patients in order to get some information about diet, physical activity and sedentary lifestyle changes in correlation to the level of their parents' instruction. Additionally, we also evaluated 20 children twice from a clinical and laboratory perspective.

Results: The study showed an increase of daily meals during COVID-19 lockdown (3.2 ± 0.4 vs 5 ± 1, P < 0.001). In particular, children whose parents have primary school diploma ate a greater significant number of meals during the lockdown, compared to those who have parents with secondary school diploma (P = 0.0019). In addition, the 95% of patients did low physical activity during the lockdown and the 97.5% spent more time in sedentary activity. Even if BMI's values don't show significant differences, they have increased after the lockdown. We didn't find any correlation between biochemical parameters before and after the lockdown.

Conclusion: The lockdown has had bad consequences on good style of life's maintenance in overweight and obese children. The absence of a significant correlation between the worsening of biochemical parameters and the lockdown doesn't allow to exclude any long-term consequences. It's safe to assume that, if the hours spent in sedentary activity and the number of meals don't diminish, there will probably repercussion on the biochemical parameters.