Abstract
Domiciliary confinement of people is one of the main strategies to limit the impact of COVID-19. Lockdowns have led to changes in lifestyle, emotional health, and eating habits. We aimed to evaluate the association of differences in dietary behaviours and lifestyle with self-reported weight gain during the COVID-19 lockdown in Chile. In this cross-sectional analytical study, five previously validated surveys were condensed into a single 86-item online questionnaire. The survey was sent to 1000 potential participants of the university community; it was kept online for 28 days to be answered. Of the 639 respondents, the mean self-reported weight gain during confinement was 1.99 kg (standard deviation [SE]: 0.17) and 0.7 (SE: 0.06) units of body mass index (BMI) (both p < 0.001) and the median difference in body weight during lockdown was 3.3% (interquartile range [IQR]: 0.0–6.7). The differences of intake of most food groups before and during lockdown were associated with greater self-reported weight, BMI and percentage weight gain. Differences in lifestyle (odds ratio [OR] = 14.21, 95% confidence interval [95%CI]: 2.35–85.82) worsening eating habits (OR = 3.43, 95%CI: 2.31–5.09), and more consumption of sweet or filled cookies and cakes during lockdown (OR = 2.11, 95%CI: 1.42–3.13) were associated with self-reported weight gain. In conclusion, different dietary behaviours (mainly consumption of industrialized foods) during lockdown, as well as quality of life deterioration were the main factors associated with self-reported weight gain during lockdown.
Highlights
One important aspect of the study of epidemics is understanding how societies react to contagious diseases [1]
Out of 182 who reported being overweight before lockdown, 17.6% (n = 32) reported metrics classifying them as having obesity during-lockdown (p < 0.001)
When we evaluated dietary factors associated with self-reported weight gains greater than or equal to 10%, we observed that the determining associated factors were the consumption of industrialized foods, but unlike those observed for self-reported weight gains of 5–9%, the consumption of starchy foods such as rice, potatoes, noodles, or quinoa were aggregated associated factors
Summary
One important aspect of the study of epidemics is understanding how societies react to contagious diseases [1]. It is estimated that nearly 4 billion people have self-quarantined at home during the pandemic, which could result in a high prevalence of psychological distress, manifested as moodiness and irritability, emotional disturbances, disturbed sleep and diet, post-traumatic stress, and depressive symptoms [3,4,5]. The impact of these restrictions on health behaviours and lifestyles remains to be fully characterised, some studies have started to address this globally [6,7,8,9,10,11]. Even when students and academics affiliated to Nutrition Societies in Spain reported better eating habits during the COVID-19 lockdown, an overall increase in self-reported body weight was noted [15]
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