to feel uneasy about what this means long term rather than surprised by the weight regain itself?

[HazelMember]

I’ve just read a BBC article about research into weight loss injections like Ozempic and Wegovy showing that people who stop taking them tend to regain weight quite quickly.

I’m not shocked that weight comes back. That happens after most weight loss attempts whether they involve medication or not.

These drugs are increasingly talked about as something people might take for years or even indefinitely. That raises questions for me about what happens when someone cannot afford them anymore, when supply changes, when side effects become an issue or when a person simply does not want to stay on a medication for life.

If stopping leads not just to regain but to a fairly rapid rebound, it feels less like a temporary aid and more like something that is very hard to step away from once started. That sits oddly with how casually they are sometimes discussed.

AIBU to think the real issue here is not that people regain weight after stopping, but whether we are quietly normalising a treatment that may be difficult to discontinue once begun? Or is this simply the reality of managing a chronic condition?

I think you misinterpreted and likely did your own projection. I’m not remotely threatened and I quite enjoy the threads, if I didn’t I’d not engage,

and I’m not envious bitter etc, I’m on the drugs, I went from a bmi of 32 to 20, no side effects, I feel fantastic, and I’m staying on a low maintenance dose , been maintaning for nearly 11 months, weight very stable, can easily afford and doing it for all the health benefits the drugs bring,

I don’t think anyone on the drugs who has a fabulous result, which is the vast majority of people feels envy or resentment to those not on them. I can’t understand your logic in thinking that.

Yes. Being obese made me miserable and hate myself. I'm healthy now so too right I'll stand up for the thing that enables that. I don't see what 'debate' is needed about a licensed medication being prescribed. I'm incredibly grateful for it and will continue to judge you for thinking that maximising my healthy years of life is up for 'debate'.

If you're so utterly unruffled, it is puzzling why you have felt the need to make so many snide little comments.

As you so pleasantly said earlier:

God alone knows. Well him and you. Anyway I’m going to stop interacting with you. I wouldn’t even look your way in real life.

And as I said: please do stop quoting me and making bizarre statements.

What I don’t understand with these ‘debates’ is what do people hope to achieve from them?

WLI can have side effects. Yep. And? So do lots of drugs.

WLI are expensive and you might need to stay on them for life. Yep. Someone using them can either choose to keep paying for them or they’ll have to come off it and hope to continue with their new way of life, maintaining their new weight. Some might put weight back on.

Some people abuse them and either shouldn’t be using them or buy from the black market. Yep. The same as with a lot of other drugs.

All of these things are true. Nobody is disputing that. But what are you hoping to get out of the debate? That the posters who have had incredible success using the drug will say ‘You know, what? You’re right. I’ll stop using the drug immediately!’ It’s so utterly fucking pointless. It seems like there’s a group of people who are so incensed that these drugs exist and are working, that they are absolutely desperate to shout about the latest negative thing they’ve read about them in the hope they’ll disappear and the fatties will get fat again…

Don't take part in the threads if they bother you that much.

Report the thread.

Hide it.

Participation is not voluntary.

Don’t you mean participation is voluntary?

Funny how posters seem to be attacking others rather than the BBC who published the article in the first place.

Are the BBC jealous and resentful and angry at 'fatties'? To use the language of the posters filled with anger and bitterness.

No. They’re interested in traffic to their website and know that a WLI story is like catnip to the type of people I posted about above.

Nobody is incensed. Why can’t things be debated? There’s a middle ground imo. Some of the WLI users are deluded too. And I say that as someone on them.
I think it needs changing so that they cannot be sold online at all. I’ve been doing a diabetes prevention programme alongside my WLI. I think it would be good to have those taking WLI seen and weighed in person at a pharmacy where things can be discussed and checked. Then nobody can lie about their weight to get them, and we’d know that everything sold online is dodgy. It’s very easy to abuse online. I bulk bought from several pharmacies as the prices were going up. I had an 8 month supply in my fridge. I’m using them properly, but I could have abused them and taken too much. And only three of the 11 pens I’ve bought in the last 8 months are showing on my nhs record. It’s all so poorly regulated.

Go and attack them then.

I’m not sure if we’ve got the resources to have every user seen in person - there’s a lot of us! But I do agree things should be tightened further to stop abuse.

Oh for god’s sake, nobody is attacking you!

I don’t think anyone on the drugs who has a fabulous result, which is the vast majority of people feels envy or resentment to those not on them. I can’t understand your logic in thinking that.

Absolutely. I’m in the insanely pleased with my results camp and get frustrated with posters wanting to scaremonger especially when it’s done with faux concern or glee. The truth is that at a population level, more obese people will live longer and healthier lives if they lose weight than if they don’t. That includes people who use WLI. We should be celebrating this, not pretending to be concerned about them putting the weight back on. And if they need medication long term to manage their ghrelin, leptin and insulin - so be it.

An alternative for me was to take statins long term. Thanks to WLI, I no longer need to and am also no longer at risk of T2D. Staying on GLP long term, if necessary is a good option for me and for many others.

@Gingercar you can get a letter from your prescriber and send it to your GP yourself if you want all your prescriptions on your NHS record.

The issues you describe are not specific to WLI, although they are amplified by the current demand and interest in them. There is a model in the UK of online prescribing, for a huge variety of prescription only medication. All of which could be dangerous if misused. Perhaps the GPhC needs more resources to do more inspections more frequently to ensure that pharmacies are following the prescribing guidelines and doing everything they can to weed out the type of people who will lie to access POM. I don't think it's appropriate or proportional to remove one medication from that model due to the issues that you describe. It would restrict access unnecessarily for the hundreds of thousands of legitimate responsible users.

I think your point brings up an issue that is overlooked - the environmental impact of the waste caused by WLIs.

I found this: https://observer.co.uk/news/national/article/weight-loss-jabs-create-expanding-problem-of-toxic-waste

Is it ok when the waste is produced by type 2 diabetics?

Here is another one:

https://cen.acs.org/pharmaceuticals/pharmaceutical-chemicals/making-weight-loss-drugs-mean/102/i13

Ah excellent, another thing to add to the bingo card....

Yes, the toxic waste is absolutely fine when it's related to producing medication for people that deserve medication, which is definitely not obese people....

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It's actually an interesting article and not something that I was aware of previously, given that no one was interested in this kind of story before it was related to weight loss. So thank you for posting it @HazelMember

Don’t fret op, it’ll be available in pill form soon - problem solved!
You’ve very much exposed yourself as someone who just doesn’t want this medication to be available to people who need to lose weight. It’s not going anywhere though so you’re going to have to find a way to come to terms with it.

This is what AI tells me. Ive had most of the drugs in these categories over the years

The pharmaceutical industry is highly inefficient, often generating up to 100 kg of waste for every 1 kg of active drug ingredient produced. The drugs that create the most industrial waste and environmental contamination are primarily antibiotics, followed by high-volume, small-molecule pharmaceuticals like analgesics and metformin.
Top Drugs and Processes Creating the Most Industrial Waste

• Antibiotics (Ciprofloxacin, Amoxicillin, Penicillin G): Antibiotic production is considered the most polluting segment of the pharmaceutical industry, particularly in India and China, where 80–90% of antibiotic APIs are produced. Wastewater from these factories often contains high concentrations of Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients (APIs) and toxic solvents, resulting in the creation of antimicrobial-resistant "superbugs".
• Small-Molecule Drugs (Generics): Small-molecule drugs generally require multi-step chemical syntheses that generate significant waste, including solvent waste, spent catalysts, and toxic byproducts.
• Metformin and Cardiovascular Drugs: High-volume, "blockbuster" drugs such as Metformin (diabetes), Atorvastatin (cholesterol), and various blood pressure medications contribute to high overall waste volume due to the immense scale of their production.
• Injectable Drugs (IVs): The production of intravenous drugs often results in a higher carbon footprint (up to 60 times higher than tablets) and significant waste due to single-use packaging.
• Newer Blockbuster Drugs (GLP-1s): The production of newer, in-demand medications like weight-loss jabs (GLP-1s) has been flagged for generating highly toxic waste that requires incineration.

I wonder if op is as concerned about the environmental impact of the first 4 in your list?

I understand this isn't on everyone's radar or list of priorities, and while choice is limited, it is what it is; we have to accept medication in the form it is currently presented. But a switch to a more environmentally sustainable method of ingestion would be great: tablets or liquid in glass jars / bottles being a gold standard.
I quit using contact lenses because, as a parent, I couldn't justify the plastic waste, though. Ditto most other single use plastics.

It’s curious isn’t it.

obesoty is the biggest killer in our society, it is the number one leading cause of cancer, it causes heart attack, stroke, diabetes, joint and skeletal degradation, fatty liver disease, the list is long. By curing it you significantly reduce these health issues in your population, and you free up billions on the nhs to then be used to treat other areas which need funding and reduce waiting lists.

but the op is not alone in being resentful they exist. There is almost daily threads. I’d have thought people would be jumping for joy about this advancement in medical science, but instead we have a bunch of resentful jealous people obsessively haunting forums about them and trying to be as negative as possible.

ultimatitly it’s irrelevant, these drugs just are not here to stay they are getting more and more advanced, more and more people taking them. The population getting healthier as it happens. But still we see this small minority of people with the bingo card not really giving a shit about health or society, I think for them it’s about vanity, appearance, being slim.

Improvements need to be made regarding safe disposal.

https://www.pharmacymagazine.co.uk/business-news/glp-1-pens-a-waste-hazard-as-users-ignorant-over-safe-disposal

As many as 500,000 people in the UK now taking GLP-1 weight loss drugs

OP, I was feeling sorry for you earlier. Thinking that you genuinely wanted to learn more about an issue that is very topical right now, and that you’d been piled on by people who are (understandably) sensitive from previous threads you were unaware of.

But you’ve lost me with this environmental angle, it seems now that you’re just trawling the internet for anything negative you can find.

Manufacturing ANYTHING is bad for the environment. Can you imagine the damage done by the mass production of painkillers you’ve likely taken many times for headaches or periods? What about your mascara or foundation or shampoo? What about the billions of dollars of UPF and fast food sold every day? Food which will now be eaten far less by those on WLI, so does that cancel out the impact of the injections?

Edited - just saw your new post above re safe disposal. Yup, definitely trawling for negatives.