Also I would argue it's much harder to lose weight with untreated apnea for a couple reasons. 1. you're constantly over tired, and working out or even walking when you've been woken up hundreds of times per night is hell. Someone with apnea can have 30 or more breathing "pauses" every hour, and all of those times, the brain wakes up in some capacity. You can go with years of that condition untreated. Imagine trying to work out every week with that amount of sleep deprivation.

2. The metabolism and appetite changes drastically. Instead of getting a break and waking up in the morning after a good night of sleep not needing food, you are constantly sugar crazy 24/7. You never get a break from the appetite and blood sugar mayhem. This makes it really difficult to change eating behavior.

The best solution is to get as many people as possible a CPAP machine so they can feel well rested and reset their system, and then they will have a much better starting point for losing weight. And yeah, you can be skinny as hell and still have sleep apnea, a bunch of people do.