Posted on 01/06/2025 8:18:51 AM PST by bitt
The GLP-1 saga epitomizes the unsustainable corruption within our medical system
Story at a Glance:
•In early 2023, a private conference with pharmaceutical industry leaders and investors highlighted anti-obesity and Alzheimer’s drugs as the next big money-makers and had the FDA head as its keynote speaker.
•Since then, the FDA has taken questionable steps to promote these drugs, particularly Ozempic, an anti-obesity medication. There's been a massive push to get everyone, including children, on Ozempic, using shockingly aggressive marketing tactics.
•This rush is eerily similar to the fen-phen craze, a temporary weight loss drug later pulled from the market for causing severe heart and lung issues.
•Worse, Ozempic comes with serious side effects, including paralyzing the digestive tract. This article will address the above controversy and explore the common causes of obesity, including those rarely discussed.
Note: recently Comedian Jimmy Dore and Food Activist Calley Means discussed The Great Ozempic Scam, an article recently published here. Their interview added a few critical points to this story, so I am publishing an abridged version of the article beginning with their interview.
6 min video
Most of the food in America comes from just a few crops like corn, wheat, soy, and canola, largely due to farming subsidies that force farmers to mass-produce these crops and sell them below cost. These cheap crops are then turned into the processed foods we eat every day. This is problematic because:
Health Issues: These foods are unhealthy and contribute to major health problems like diabetes and obesity.
Natural Aversion: Our bodies naturally resist these foods, making them hard to sell.
Addictive Additives: To make them more appealing, addictive substances are added. In the 1980s, Big Tobacco bought the processed food industry and, much like they did with cigarettes, focused on making these foods as addictive as possible.
Chronic Illness: The resulting health issues create lifelong customers for industries like Big Pharma.
...more
p
These drugs have been around for more than a decade.
It’s not something “new.”
The VA offered me this option. Thanks to a video I saw by Tucker Carlson I turned it down.
“This rush is eerily similar to the fen-phen craze, a temporary weight loss drug later pulled from the market for causing severe heart and lung issues.”
indeed ... i’ll never forget that ... best to wait to evaluate long-term effects of weight-loss drugs ...
and then of course, GLP-1s have one tiny little drawback aside from being exorbitantly expensive and causing a plethora of negative digestive side-effects that cause a large percentage of folks to quit taking them before a year is up, namely you have to take them the rest of your life because the minute you stop, you’ll soon gain all the lost weight back!
We used to have healthy food, until about 50 years ago, but now with all of the GMO and cross-breeding, about the only healthy food we can eat is meat, fish, and animal-derived products (such as eggs, cheese, etc.). The problem with today’s Frankenfoods is that they’re so new that our bodies haven’t had time to adapt to them...hence we get obesity and diabetes epidemics (and no, women didn’t go Planet Fitness 50+ years ago, nor did they need to).
People want a quick fix for their own mistakes. TV, Social Media and everything you see or read inundates folks hundreds of times daily to take a drug for something.
Folks dumb enough to buy the BS get what they deserve.
In the late 1800s, physicians began using thyroid hormones to treat obesity.
The 1940s marked the beginning of amphetamine use for weight loss.
The FDA approved a new central nervous system stimulant called phentermine for weight loss in 1959.
In 1960, the FDA approved the oral tablet Didrex® (benzphetamine hydrochloride), a central nervous system stimulant that can promote weight loss.
The FDA approved Bontril® PDM (phendimetrazine tartrate) in 1976 for the treatment of obesity.
During the 1970s, the FDA also approved fenfluramine, an oral tablet commonly used as an appetite suppressant at that time.
Over-the-counter appetite suppressants containing phenylpropanolamine (PPA) became more popular in the 1980s.
Another short-lived weight loss medication emerged in the 1990s with the introduction of fen-phen—the combination of fenfluramine with phentermine. Evidence linking fen-phen to valvular heart disease led to fen-phen’s quick demise.
In 2005, the FDA approved the very first GLP-1 agonist to treat people with type 2 diabetes.
Exenatide paved the way for future GLP-1s, providing new treatment options for people with obesity.
Meanwhile, Alli® (orlistat) oral capsules became available over the counter in 2007.
In the 2010s
Victoza® injections for diabetes (2010)
Saxenda® injections for obesity (2014)
Ozempic injections for diabetes (2017)
Rybelsus® tablets for diabetes (2019)
The FDA in 2014 approved Contrave® tablets as a weight loss treatment featuring naltrexone (an opioid antagonist) and bupropion (an antidepressant) as active ingredients.
Now we have the flavors of the day
Wegovy for weight loss (2021)
Mounjaro® for diabetes (2022)
Zepbound® for weight loss (2023)
The active ingredient in Wegovy (semaglutide) is the same active ingredient in Ozempic and Rybelsus. The difference is that weekly Ozempic injections and daily Rybelsus tablets are not approved for weight management.
I asked VA for it and they approved. I am Type 2 diabetic. It replaced metformin.
I lost 30 lbs in a heart beat.
My guts were ok. I played a lot of golf from march to october so i was getting a fair amount of exercise.
I asked if they could up the dosage(I was trying to lose an extra 10-15 lbs)
they approved.
my guts went haywire. I was in a constipation-diarrhea cycle that was driving me nutz.
I asked if it was ok to back off. They approved.
My guts are back to somewhat normal.
My exercise has gone dormant in the winter
I put on back on 20 lbs. as I am eating thru the appetite suppression.
Time to do something different.
Wow I had NO IDEA.
I started a ozempic but I got a bunch of floaters in my eyes a few days later and stopped.
Could have been coincidence.
I looked it up after the floaters and saw that blindness was a rare, maybe very very rare side effect and that was that.
The floaters DID happen though right after starting it.
But at my weight, I wont live another 10 years so is it worth it?
I dont know.
The FDA head was at this quaint little private meeting.
They all knew about the side effects back then, they all remembered fen-phen, they all did not care. Profit was the driving factor.
CEOs tend to be sociopaths.
Why pick on Ozempic? Mounjaro seems to be more effective as a weight loss drug if you are into that. Victoza, another GLP-1 has been around for 17 years, not pulled for adverse effects yet.
Why can’t people just change their eating and exercising habits during the time that they lose the initial large amount of weight and then keep up with the new habits after they go off of the drug? This is a serious question.
Obesity is an enormous problem in this country. The amount of money to pay for healthcare for the enormous number of people who have type two diabetes will not be possible for all the side effects of the obesity crisis in the future.
And don’t forget that if you’re allergic to any those, don’t take them. Lol.
But seriously, I don’t take anything on a regular basis. Asprin if I get a headache.
Skinny people do not like it when fat people lose weight. How can they feel superior if the fat people become skinny people??
A Tucker Carlson interview with Casey Means.
Casey used to be a lobbyist for the government and knows how big pharma, big ag, big medicine, and big food work together.
He reveals a lot about what’s going on behind closed doors. This interview is 41 minutes long, but is very good.
Big Pharma Is Fooling You Again, and You Don’t Even Know It
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vzRjkNYT-U8
That’s Calley Means. His sister is Casey and she knows the medical complex from the inside, being a surgeon.
Apparently the drug suppresses appetite.
I think the low carb and keto diets can be very effective for a lot of people; after a few days on that, the appetite is suppressed, too.
But it’s a very drastic change in more ways than one.
Food plays a bigger part in our lives than just nutrition; it involves very emotional matters, too.
I’m sure it’s very hard for many people to lose weight.
That’s irrelevant.
The push for them is and it’s completely uncalled for.
There’s far too much profit in keeping people unhealthy and on medicine instead of getting people to eat better and exercise more and lose weight.
If it hasn't permanently, or long term paralyzed your digestive tract.
And God knows what other side effects.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.