Is it the begining of the end for Weight loss injections?

I know turns out when you're high as a kite so you can ignore your emotions and smoke like a chimney you probably don't want a lot of food. But everyone was slim and healthy before we all discovered chips and the sofa.

Wow, no wonder they were all so thin then! Couple of million people on WLIs in 2025 looks positively tame by comparison.

Not very unusual at all! At its height in 1979, 30 million benzodiazepine prescriptions were written annually. By 1976, one in 20 prescriptions in Britain was for Valium. https://www.historyhit.com/mothers-little-helper-the-history-of-valium/ . In 1969, 1,700,000 prescriptions for amphetamines were made in England and Wales and that was a reduction on previous levels! https://hansard.parliament.uk/commons/1971-04-08/debates/00e3e71b-79fb-466a-9c58-4c08ffb7566e/Amphetamines

The last couple of posts on this thread are fun Discussion of cigarettes being sold as an appetite suppressant and prescription speed in the 70s!

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5472274-if-you-are-on-weight-loss-injections-what-do-you-make-of-this-article?page=12&reply=149770139

I'd like to hope the latter was fairly unusual. But not far off half the adult population was smoking at the time so that definitely wasn't. If we want to talk about why things are different now to how they were 50 years ago, millions being on a different appetite suppressant drug has to be relevant.

Nothing wrong with trying to reform the food industry, but we need to do this in the full knowledge that there has never been a time when we all had enough to eat, weren't smoking like chimneys and didn't have a weight gain problem. People who think that's possible are guessing. All societies with enough money mean people start piling it on eventually.

But you don't NEED a lot of calories. Most people just eat them anyway. Watched 'The 70's diet' only 2 parts but it clearly shows how it all went so wrong then. Portions now are huge in comparison and it's become normalised now.
Medicine shouldn't be there to fix habits we develop and could prevent but it would require a giant societal shake up and companies not allowed to sell us addictive poisons under the guise of food.

They will renew for a new purpose..

IF you are granted a patent, you can renew it annually for 20 years, the rules are slightly different for drugs, as there will be regulatory considerations after the patent has been granted. A patent has to be for a novel product /process or use, so the information can not have already been published.

For those of us who don't know how this sort of thing works, can organisations just renew medical patents? Found this but not sure if it would be the right procedure.

https://www.gov.uk/renew-patent

Wegovy goes off patent in the UK in 2028, Mounjaro in 2032.

I think the patents will be renewed. Wishful thinking.

Blimey

On NYE I was chatting with the CEO of a UK based drugs company. He predicted that when the patent expires on the drugs in 7 years (I think?) the average monthly cost to buy it will be approx. £25 - £35 a month. So very affordable to many, many more people.

@Boomer55hardly anyone gets WLI on the NHS. The almost entire majority of the millions taking them are already paying for them privately.

Yeah, either take it or don’t . It’s not a badge of honour either way. If the NHS stop funding it after a period of time, then pay or come off it. 🙄

God another thread about WLI - honestly can people just let others do what they like and stop talking about it - Just tedious now and always fuelled by jealousy.

I mean, maybe in like 30 to 50 years from now that might happen, perhaps. But the NHS is planning to take 12 years to roll out initial prescribing of Mounjaro to obese people, in several stages. That's all they've planned for so far. There isn't going to be a sudden policy switch to start prescribing it for maintenance to people who are at healthy weight but can't afford a private prescription any more. Of all the things to have a concern about, this is not something that is likely to be happening.

Same, my guess is it's still a way away yet.

Because a case might be made that if people who have slimmed down using these drugs regain the weight, then they will re-enter higher risk diabetes/heart disease/impaired mobility territory, even be at a higher risk of cancer, so the govt/NHS decides continuing to provide them with maintenance doses of GLP1s is the lesser of two evils/more cost-effective in the long run.

Unless and until we get to the point that GLP1s are prescribed freely like HRT or statins then no, why would the NHS pay? I think we will get to this point but not for another 15-20 years.

If a person loses a lot of weight using whatever method, won't their metabolic weight change, so they need a lot fewer calories.

No, the NHS does not and will not "step in" and cover the costs. Don't worry about that ever being the case, it really won't be. That's not how the NHS works.

People will prioritise what is important to them. If you lose your job, retire or your circumstances change, what would you do to prioritise paying for things that are very important to you? Get another job, plan adequately for retirement, or temporary changes to your personal life etc etc.

Some people who have already had to stretch beyond their means to afford a private prescription may have to change their medication to a cheaper one, or possibly stop. That would be difficult for them of course, but as it's private medicine that is always a risk, and most people would consider that before starting a lengthy programme of treatment.

I can’t imagine for a second they would. You’d either maintain eating within your calorie allowance and exercising, or you’d get fat again.

What happens if you're on it long-term paying privately, then at some point you lose your job/retire/ your circumstances change, and you can no longer afford it? Does the NHS step in at that stage to cover the costs? I have a feeling that they will need to, as a case will be made for the 'cost implications of treating future obesity'.

Considering half my healthcare colleagues are on it, I’m not sure there’s much concern.

Some medications are time limited to treat a specific illness (eg antibiotics for an infection). Some are for long term use at the discretion of the patient and doctor (eg contraception), some are for lifelong use for a permanent medical condition (eg insulin).

i think the general public are viewing them as time limited drugs like antibiotics, whereas many of us who are talking WLIs view them as a lifelong medication for a permanent medical condition, ie obesity. I view my obesity as caused by the imbalance of GLP1 in my brain, and mounjaro is fixing that and so I will need to keep taking it to stop putting weight back on. In the same way that people with high cholesterol find their levels rise if they stop taking their statins.