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.

This is how it makes me feel - food noise is a apt description

@shellswirl I actually find this whole thread questioning my prescription for a medicine (Mounjaro), for a diagnosed medical condition of obesity, really offensive - I can’t imagine mumsnet would let any other threads stand questioning a drug which has been approved by the NHS.

Mounjaro has been personally prescribed for me by a GMC regulated Doctor - So are you questioning the validity of their profession and decision by the Medicines Regulatory Authority to approve this drug for obesity treatment?

I can’t imagine you would criticise any other group for being prescribed a medication to help them manage their condition. So why are you so judgemental and critical of those suffering with obesity. I think it’s really cruel.

Here is a link to a podcast transcript discussing risks including muscle loss, suicidal thoughts and gastroperesis. All the studies are linked. It is good news on the muscle loss and suicidal thoughts - less good on the gastric issues including bezoars. It is all based on science and research and not on gut feelings and morality.

Less good news re muscle loss:

Ozempic and Muscle Loss — Do You Need to Worry? – Diabetes Daily

Yes - In fact ALL LC diets involve the body breaking down muscle along side body fat as fuel - this is because the muscles store glycogen which is the body’s first choice for fuel. The body only moves on to body fat once glycogen stores are depleted.

This is NOT specific to a diet on Ozempic/Mounjaro. Ketogenic diets are theorised to reduce the muscle loss because the glycogen is not repleted (you need to eat carbs to create new stores of glycogen).

However, as mentioned above, there are considerable health risks connected to long term ketogenic diets (high cholesterol due to high fat intake, kidney failure due to ketoacidosis etc).

But these facts will likely be ignored along with all the others posted above, with the links to peer reviewed contemporary research supporting it. It doesn’t suit the ‘let’s sneer at people who are trying an alternative, medically supported route to reclaiming their health’ narrative of the OP.

Not what that article above says, and not what the scant trials looking into it have found.

The sample is not huge, with fewer than 200 patients overall, but the two trials agreed: Semaglutide users lost about 40 percent lean mass and 60 percent fat.
How does that compare with people losing weight by other means? In most overweight adults, “fat-free mass contributes only ∼20–30 percent to total weight loss,” according to a 2017 review. If this generalization is accurate, it suggests that semaglutide may be causing an undue amount of muscle loss, as much as double the expectation.

You are completely wrong about the reasons for muscle loss during rapid weight loss.

This.

The Op did not post in good faith or with any genuine curiosity as to why society might benefit from these medications. It was a troll post made to create an opportunity to belittle those of us who use them - whether we are too weak and lazy to stick to a diet of her prescription, or are too stupid to do thorough research and make informed decisions over medication after consultation with medically qualified personnel.

Never mind that OP has not read and digested a single like to that research PP’s have proffered up to counter her comments.

Am leaving this thread now.

The prescription can be done online. I got it without seeing anybody in the flesh. Add a couple of stone onto the weight you enter (NO checks are done) and voila

I'm not a troll. Just because you don't agree with an opinion you can't just go round saying you are a troll.

It's been big news and debated over the last few months. You only need to pick a copy of a newspaper to read all about it.

If you chose to be offended then that's on you.

I think this is so widely discussed because for years we've been told exercise and diet.

And now suddenly to be told it doesn't work...certainly not on a society level as you all said. I've never felt comfy treating conditions without working out the exact cause.

you've got people lying to get hold of medicines. Or "influenced" by Hollywood celebrities. It's a bit different to your standard penicillin or other prescription medication isn't it. You don't see people going on Oprah show to chat about their statins or their nasal sprays.,

Feel free to leave the thread

I’ve just been through the process on Med Express and it asked for a recent full length photo, plus photo ID.

For those on it, has your sleep quality improved?

Same here. I also have to regularly track my weight on their website and have been asked to send updated photos in order to continue my prescription. Far more evidence required than any other medication I have ever purchased online.

products like orlistat have been available for years online in a similar way - why are some so focused on the potential for misuse of glp-1s but aren’t catastrophising about other equally available weight loss medications?

Quality of sleep was a bit worse, actually, but I had issues before it so not sure what is attributable to wegovy vs. Perimenopause

People usually have proportionally more lean tissue compared to fat after medicated weight loss ie a better body composition. They lose more fat than lean tissue (which includes water btw). Tirzepatide, which hits two hormones not just GLP-1, is even more effective for fat loss with fat accounting for 3/4 of mass lost. All weight loss causes some lean tissue loss. Interestingly simple dieting often causes a loss of fat free tissue of around 35%. Obese people often have more muscle than normal weight people just from carrying all that extra weight but the muscle may be ‘poor quality’ so it might be that reduction in muscle mass just reflects a the typical body composition of a healthy weight person and the muscle retained is better quality. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5421125/

I have to say lots of people like to think their cholesterol is 'genetic' when it's actually their diet. And yes, GPs put it down to that because a. they are not trained on diet and b. easier to get the patient to take the statins when they know they're not going to make the changes to their diet.

I wouldn't say it was sudden. We've known for a long time that people who lose weight are more likely than not to put it all back on again. And the overweight and obesity rates have only been going in one direction! This is not new information.

It is true that this hasn't necessarily always been made clear. The dieting industry does very well out of that obfuscation, for example. And if you went to your GP for advice on weight loss, you'd likely get some version of the eat less move more spiel. But none of that means we didn't know already that it doesn't work.

I agree with your point. But if you actually look at Orlistat most people only lose about half a stone on it. I was prescribed it - it did absolutely nothing!

Haven’t read all the posts but I am taking low dose ozempic at the moment (have done 3 weeks on 0.25).

I am just in the overweight category (bmi 26). I do have prediabetes and a strong family history of diabetes.

this is despite me undergoing a very extensive health and fitness regime over the past 18 months. I lost 8lbs initially and then stalled. I’ve tried fasting, lower calories and lower carb. I exercise a lot.

I still could not lower my AC1 (blood sugar). My endocrinologist suggested I try ozempic and see what effect it has. I’ve lost 4-5lbs since starting 3 weeks ago after over a year of losing nothing. I haven’t really changed my eating habits although I my appetite is slightly reduced. I hope to see reduced AC1 at my next blood test.

There has obviously been some kind of metabolic effect (insulin / blood sugar regulation) for me to suddenly lose weight without changing much in my diet. I have tried so hard to do this on my own and it was incredibly frustrating to do all the right things and my body block progress.

I hope to take it for another 6 weeks at which point I’m at MY healthy weight (BMI around 22/23) and hopefully I’ve reset whatever metabolic issues I had. Of course I can’t know what happens when I stop taking it. Let’s see!

So people arent as outraged by it because it doesn’t work as well? Which seems to prove the point that thin people just don’t want fat people to be thin. It means they lose their superiority.

This just isn't true though, is it.

I'm losing weight by low carbing and calorie counting. I'm eating whole foods, no UPF, no takeway etc. My appetite is decreasing, my waist is decreasing, but because I am exercising 6 days a week (spin, bodypump, swimming) I am building muscle.

No injections are ever going to be better for someone than the above.

It's like putting a sticking plaster over a fracture. You can kid yourself that it's helping but when you take it off, nothing will have healed. You need to get to the the root cause of why you have disordered eating and what's made you obese in the first place. If you don't tackle the psychological before you tackle the physical, you're setting yourself up for failure.

Look at shows like My 600lb life. One of the first things the Dr does is to get the patients to speak to a psychologist. The ones who refuse to engage tend to be the ones who make zero progress on the weight loss program. Fitness trainer Jillian Michaels is also a big advocate of brain first, then body. She has also, like the OP, predicted a massive fallout from these drugs. Watch her video "the truth about Ozempic they aren't telling you." The side effects are terrifying!

I think the real driver behind all the fake outrage isn’t that these weight loss meds are available online (as others have been for years) or that these are less safe (many supplements are widely available with less data and potentially concerning SEs), but that they work so effectively. Some people like to complain about obesity rates, but view it moralistically and therefore aren’t willing to accept weight loss that hasn’t been sufficiently ‘earned’ through lots of hard work. No one is upset about orlistat being available because it doesn’t work very well.

@Purplerain1234 were you ‘effortlessly’ slim beforehand? Was AC1 dangerously high? Thanks.

@Purplerain1234 I mean re: effortlessly slim
in 20s. Have you noticed particular loss/slimming on stomach area?