All these weight loss drugs... surely we are heading towards disaster?

[shellswirl]

So as we all know there are various weight loss drugs that have become very popular in recent months.

It seems like the whole of Hollywood is using it.

Even regular people are spending huge amounts of money on it from online pharmacies.

I get that these drugs might be useful for certain people with real medical conditions, but really a lot of people are using it as a quick fix to be thin.

With no consideration to side effects or future health. And without thinking about what happens when you stop it?

Surely the best way to lose weight involves no drugs. No fad diets. But exercising more, moving more, eating a balanced diet. Retraining your brain and finding food and exercise you enjoy.

I say this as an overweight person too! Surely there are other ways.

If every other person is taking these drugs won't there be a huge pool of people to monitor side effects etc?

Aibu to say the whole thing makes me feel very uneasy.

There’s been lots of stuff in the press about how good they are for all sorts of conditions
I could probably benefit from them
But it just doesn’t feel right. Apparently it can remove your drive for sex, food, alcohol…. It’s like we are neutering our brains somehow
Changing our brain chemistry. Can this be OK?
Hopefully they are a magic bullet and cure loads of our Western diseases. But it feels wrong to me right now.

Obesity is not good for us long term.

Apparently it can remove your drive for sex, food, alcohol

This sounds like scaremongering to me! I certainly haven’t lost my desire for sex and it’s much harder resist wine than food! It does reduce your drive to eat, but if anything it has hugely enhanced my enjoyment of the food I do it. I taste things more fully and have developed a love for cooking that I never had before.

@Etincelle

We all agree that obesity isn't good

But taking drugs is not the ONLY solution surely

Before all this people were talking about going on diets to reverse type two diabetes. So it is possible in some cases.

We live in a capitalist society so we can't control the production of food so tightly that the only foods available are 'clean' foods. Imagine the effect on food production, jobs lost etc.

The foods that we eat are addictive and like with any other kind of substance, some people will become addicted and some won't. It's not a moral failing. Do you object to the use of medication to assist people with withdrawing from street drugs OP? Or would you say it's great that they're getting help and trying to do something about their situation, and anything they're given that's legal and regulated by pharmaceutical companies is much likely to be safer than the condition they would find themselves in otherwise?

I do also agree with some of the points made about disordered eating. I'm not sure how much psychological assessment there is prior to drugs being prescribed but I know eating disorder specialists who are concerned about them. Weight loss can be a trigger for the development of an eating disorder and anorexia has the highest death rate of any mental health condition.

@Damnyourheadshoulderskneesandtoes

Surely heroin is more dangerous and addictive that cereal bars and crisps?

Most drugs affect your brain chemistry, ever taken a paracetamol?

I'm not talking about chocolate bars and crisps, I'm talking about obesity.

I’m watching with interest.

This stuff always has side effects down the line. The massive ageing is one effect. I can’t believe how old they all look post weight loss. I’m not sure if it’s the speed of the weight loss that does it or the drug itself. Then of course you have people like Sharon Osbourne who is an absolute skeleton right now but said she can’t put any weight back on. Are we going to see people yo-yo from obesity to anorexia?

There's a difference in people struggling with unexplained obesity and difficult to treat medical conditions causing obesity - and people who are just a bit overweight through diet and exercise. For the former group using this medication is life saving, for the latter it's a short term fix that will likely cause more long term problems than it fixes - like using a chain saw to cut a twig.

Trouble is the view of healthy weight and body health in general is so skewed - it's pushing mildly overweight people to think they're obese and need medical intervention. BMI is a flawed measurement and visceral fat (the baddie) isn't easy to measure at home. I do think diets globally are getting terrible and lack of exercise due to long work days and stressful lives doesn't help either. Stress adds to weight gain even if you eat healthy and exercise. I've always wondered why South Asia had such an obesity crisis despite processed food not being as common and people eating more veg than meat, more home cooked meals - but it's the stressful environment they live in, and also the lack of physical activity in a culture that outsources all manual work.

Also women's weight is hormone dependent too and so little research is done to understand how we can balance hormones or even know when they're out of whack. I'm never sure how much any medication is tested for effects on women's hormones. Or signed off despite effects on the menstrual cycle because they know women won't pay attention to that side effect, we've been conditioned to suffer from irregularities.

Guess I'm saying there isn't an easy way to fix obesity because it would require substantial lifestyle changes for everyone which isn't possible. I do agree that weight loss medication should be more closely regulated and not available to all especially teenagers buying it online.

It's not as easy as you describe, if it was you presumably would have done it yourself. Most people could reverse type 2 diabetes also with plant diet and exercise but it's not easy to 'retrain your brain'. See ongoing addiction as an example.

For many people there is another way, and it's not exactly a secret. Diet and exercise will work for many (not all, but many). Yes it's challenging in a world where rubbish is cheap, addictive and freely available, and you need a healthy relationship with yourself and with food to achieve it, but it's doable.

I mean this respectfully but this to me highlights that it’s the conditions that lead to obesity and not the other way round. You and your mum both seem to have had issues with your body first that caused you to become fat.

I don’t think anyone should feel ashamed for trying whatever they feel is best in terms of weight loss - I mean we all know that being fat is the worst thing you could possibly be, and fat people are singlehandedly causing the downfall of the NHS and our country. (Sarcasm in case it’s not obvious). It’s hardly surprising people would do anything they could not to be fat.

That said, I wish we didn’t have to put ourselves through this sort of thing.

Surely the best way to lose weight involves no drugs. No fad diets. But exercising more, moving more, eating a balanced diet. Retraining your brain and finding food and exercise you enjoy.

If no drugs works well for someone, then definitely I don't think anyone would argue with you (for that specific someone).

If every other person is taking these drugs won't there be a huge pool of people to monitor side effects etc?

Need quadruple blinded randomised controlled trials to accurately measure side effects. Before and after events are more coincidence than proof of cause & effect and very prone to reporting biases.

The first GLP-1 agonist was approved for diabetes in 2005

It's just another way to shame fat people. We get sneered at for being fat, now we get sneered at for doing something to improve our health. If moving more and eating less worked, then there would be no obesity crisis because whatever some of the people on MN and in society at large think, we are not stupid or thick. We have a problem for which there are few known cures - diet and exercise, as someone said up thread, are preventative but for a real cure for obesity then medication and surgery are the only two options. Personally I plan on trying a weight loss drug before I go to get cut open.

I guess the main problem is that it is seen as cheating in some way because obviously all fat people, as well as being thick are lazy. By admitting that a medication is the best option, is for some in society to admit that they judged us wrongly and unfairly and that really obesity is a multi-faceted and genetic condition.

If I was able to take some wonder drug to lose weight, I would!

What worries me more than the side effects is this end result of lots of loose skin and not being able to fix that via surgery as crazy as that sounds.

I wish I could be happy in my own skin but years of dieting, exercising being told 'you'd look so pretty if you lost some weight' by my own mother and family, years of media fat shaming etc, then throw menopause in to the mix where my belly has just decided that fat, bloated and pregnant looking is the way forward, there's always a part of me that just feels miserable about my weight.

Though I have decided I will not spend another penny on weight loss because its futile for me. I'm 44 and as far back as I can remember, I've been on a diet of some sort from Slimming World, WW, slim pod, hypnotherapy, noom, boot camp, gym memberships, slim fast, cabbage soup diet, the pre-op egg diet. I'm tired, I'm done.

However if people are having luck with these weight loss then surely that's a good thing and kinda jealous that they have the means to do it.

Nah this is just one example of what DRUGS are for

Have you ever been massively overweight? I need to lose a good 7-9 stone (7 would just put me back to the cusp of overweight rather than hugely obese). Losing weight on your own is not as simple as saying "I'll just stop eating" as you still need to actually eat.

Giving up cigarettes was a piece of piss for me. This is hellish.

I can't comment on the celebs, but in the UK you have to have a bmi of 30+, which is in the obese range.

Apparently it can remove your drive for sex, food, alcohol…. It’s like we are neutering our brains somehow
Changing our brain chemistry. Can this be OK?

But then what does long term obesity do to the body? For a lot it kills their sex drive either through diabetes or having such poor body image. Then theres high cholesterol, high blood pressure and all the other horrible side effects that metabolic disease brings.

I was initially very against all these drugs for weight loss and did see it as the easy option, and I’m speaking as someone with a healthy BMI, but I now am of the conclusion that if it was that easy to lose weight for all, then we wouldn’t be in this mess.

Surely a drug that cuts the risk of all the above and stops the pressure on the NHS has got to be better financially as I do believe the cost of the drugs will mitigate the cost to the NHS long term of not treating obesity.

For those that ask why I am not doing it if diet and exercise is so easy, I am.

I'm doing better these days. I have a couple of stone to lose. I'm a size 14. I don't have diabetes. I don't drink alcohol, I exercise with a PT A couple of times a week. I'm trying on the food. I'm trying to reduce stress. It's nothing that can't be improved, a work in progress.

There are so many things that are pushed into us and people say "this is good for you" then it turns out down the line there are issues, coverups, and long term implications. I am not abnormal for feeling suspicious.

@Usernameisnotavailable0

Aren't people just buying the stuff online though? Through private pharmacies?

So OP, if you know what you have to do to lose weight, why are you overweight?

I take DRUGS everyday to help with a medical condition I have. I think obesity is a medical condition and can’t see the issue with people taking medication for it. I don’t see it as any different.