Posted on 12/20/2024 8:28:47 PM PST by SeekAndFind
Research published in the last week revealed that for the first time in more than a decade, obesity rates among US adults fell slightly last year, decreasing from 46% in 2022 to 45.6% in 2023. While we might need a few more years of data to conclusively tie these results to the rise of semaglutide drugs like Novo Nordisk’s Ozempic, it feels impossible to ignore the timing, with Novo’s sales booming in recent years and hitting a record ~$10 billion in its latest quarter.
Sales of these GLP-1 treatments — drugs that mimic the effects of blood-sugar-regulating hormone GLP-1, a feature originally intended for diabetes care but which also happened to cause weight loss in test subjects — have increased by almost 6x since the start of 2018. To effectively market both of the major positive side effects of GLP-1 treatments, Novo Nordisk separated its semaglutide brands into Ozempic (for diabetes) and Wegovy (for weight loss). Sales of each have soared, helping the Danish company unseat luxury giant LVMH as Europe’s most valuable company.
Of course, success breeds competition. While Novo Nordisk endures as the first and last word in weight-loss drugs, rival remedies like Eli Lilly’s tirzepatide-based Mounjaro and Zepbound have also seen soaring sales as other pharmaceutical giants like Viking Therapeutics race to produce their own alternative treatments.
As GLP-1s have gone mainstream, supply has been a critical constraint — an unwelcome trend for diabetes patients who need the drugs for their intended purpose, with telehealth companies receiving thousands of reports of shortages.
Indeed, Ozempic is now so widespread that it has its own place in popular culture, as GLP-1 treatments have become synonymous with an evolved iteration of a modern consumer’s desire for thinness. This year alone, weight-loss drugs featured heavily in satirical cartoons, Halloween costumes, and celebrity endorsements — not to mention countless tabloid dissections of “Ozempic face,” a term used to describe the look of those who’ve rapidly lost weight using the drug.
For such a widely popular treatment that’s still so new, it follows that scientists everywhere are trying to grasp the effects that weight-loss drugs will have on users’ lives in years to come. One recent report linked Ozempic to sudden blindness while another suggested it might delay aging (see: The Substance), and weight-loss drugs have also received nods in the symptom categories of kidney disease (reduces!), cholesterol (reduces!), and, er, burps (increases, unfortunately).
Predicting when a world-changing discovery is going to be made is hard. Accurately predicting its impact is arguably even harder. The iPhone only launched in 2007, before which we barely used the word “app”; AI hype has hit fever pitch this year; and, though semaglutide products were first approved by the FDA in 2021 and some writers called last year “The Year of Ozempic,” knock-on effects of the weight-loss drug boom are still being felt moving into 2025.
I am always concerned about side effects but it would be wonderful to get my excess fat off. After my thyroid went low I never have had control over weight loss. Even with thyroxine pills.
I wonder if all over the country people will start having problems and then be in the “call this number and a lawyer will see if you can be part of the company’s financial settlement if you took this prescription between these years....”
I understand your concern. All prescription drugs have side effects.
I take just one, Lisinopril, for heart.
There are ways to lose weight without those meds. It’s hard to diet in the first couple of months, but soon you become accustomed to eating less. And eating better foods. You make up for higher prices by just eating less. Exercise helps too. Try to walk every day for half an hour at least. In bad weather I got to local supermarket and walk up and down every aisle, get at least 15 minutes.
Of course you could join a gym.
I’ve lost 110 pounds in 2024. But no drugs were involved.
Thanks for the advice.
I did not know they were injections. I thought capsules or tablets.
Feeling sad? Take a pill! Feeling restless? Take a pill! Have a twitching pinky? Take a pill for it! Hating your job? Anxious?Angry at your spouse? Take a pill for it! Can't sleep? Take a pill for it! Pining for that new $4,000 IPhone but can't afford it? Take a pill for it! Eat like a gluttonous pig, eat junk food, never get off the damn couch and therefore look like a main character in Moby Dick? Why, don't change your personal habits. That would involve self-examination and work. Simply take a pill for it and shove another 300 greasy, double cheeseburgers down your gullet!
America has become a nation of pill poppers, thanks to the media-pharmaceutical advertising nexus and dissatisfied people looking for a quick fix for all their mostly self-made problems. Ugh.
I used Zyban to quit smoking, but it didn’t make me lose the desire to smoke. It just made cigarettes not have any effect. Still worked because I took a pill in the morning and even when getting cravings knew that there is no point having a cigarette, because it wouldn’t do anything.
Thanks, Nick. No, never tried those. Yes, I assume it’s for life. At my age, there are SO many daily pills, it’s just another one. I’ve always refused insulin because I don’t “do” needles, so this was the drug of choice for them to pull me down fast. I would have been off it after the first pill if I’d had any bad side effects.
but self control is required.
That is a huge problem for many, myself included. Its not a craving or addiction for sweets and “processed” foods...its an almost addictive need for carbs like rice, pasta and potatoes.
And we are not talking mass quantities or even daily amounts but the ingestion of minimal amounts that wreck many “diets”.
Or by ceasing to pay millions to gorge on bad food paid for with SNAP bux.
Dumb to use tax money to fatten people and then more to treat it.
Self control is the best way. But Ozempic and similar are a solid second best. To reduce Federal & state outlays for the obese and the diabetic. I am a bottom line guy. Get Americans healthier, whatever way that is effective. Enough with the self-centered, self control lectures!
Another voice in a growing choir!
As I have shared, ad nauseum, my doctors cannot figure out what is up with my weight.
I recently went through ANOTHER period of strict calorie control, pared with specific exercise goals, that should have resulted in me losing AT LEAST two pounds a week. No cheating. My wife monitored me (I have a witness!).
After a month I had lost about a pound and a half.
For some reason I burn only about 50 to 60 percent of the calories of a normal person. I have low heart rate, low body temperature, normal to low blood pressure.
Unfortunately, the next step is a FULL endocrine work up which insurance doesn't cover and would cost me about $10K.
For the "eat less, exercise more" Nazis...that isn't ALWAYS the cure. Sure, there are overweight people who eat like pigs, but not ALL overweight people eat like pigs and there are more and more being diagnosed every day.
What’s your TSH and T3 AND T4?
In other news, “The mortality of fat people skyrocketed under Covid.”
That would also explain a decrease.
SNORT.
My daughter worked for the Ozembic Novo Nordisk plant construction in North Carolina, specializing in engineering robotic pharmaceutical production, and then switched to operations after the plant went into production.
After spending over $2 billion on the first production facility, now they are building a second production facility near the first as even with 24/7/365 production they still cannot meet demand.
Discovery and function of GLP-1 drugs.
Discovery of exendin-4
In the 1990s, Dr. John Eng discovered that exendin-4, a component of the Gila monster’s venom, had a similar structure and effects to GLP-1. Exendin-4 was synthesized and tested in animal models, and in 2005 the FDA approved exenatide (Byetta), a synthetic version of exendin-4, to treat type 2 diabetes.
Discovery of GLP-1
In 1986, Jens Juul Holst and Joel Habener identified the amino acid sequence of GLP-1, a hormone produced in the small intestine that regulates blood sugar levels and appetite.
How the venom of a lizard led to one of the most important scientific discoveries of modern Medicine.
GLP-1 is a hormone produced in the small intestine that stimulates insulin secretion from pancreatic beta cells, suppresses glucagon release, and slows gastric emptying.
Exendin-4: From lizard to laboratory…and beyond. National Institute on Aging.
https://www.nia.nih.gov/news/exendin-4-lizard-laboratory-and-beyond.
I do not believe that.
I look at hundreds of shoppers in my neighborhood mall, every day, on my evening walk.
At the most - 10% of white adults are obese. Almost no Asian adults are obese.
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