What do we REALLY think about the weight loss jabs?

[Newbabynewhouse]

I've put this on AIBU rather than weight loss jab because I want a neutral audience rather than people who are all using the jab.
What are peoples thoughts on the jab? I'd love to hear from someone educated in the medical field about whether these are actually safe for people without diabetes.
I'm obese and I have lost a stone so far by dieting although it's taking me a long time! I know if I keep trying hard I can lose what I need to. Lots of people I know have started dropping weight from using the jabs and I am tempted however, can't shake a feeling that there's something not quite right.
What I mean by this is... these jabs have been around for years for diabetic people, so why have they only just been 'released' to people despite obesity effecting the NHS for years?
I know a woman who fainted in work the other day with gallbladder issues, she's on the jab.
Also, I'm going to sound a little conspiracy theorist now, but, isn't it odd these jabs became popular straight after people starting refusing to have more covid jabs..?.. I'd love to hear from people with a bit of background info or medical professionals to tell me whether I'm overthinking or if I'm onto something?

The safest way to loose weight is to eat less and move more. However if it were that simple no one would be obese. The jabs may carry risks as does all medication but they are considered ‘safe’ and there are measures in place to stop them being prescribed to those with particular risk factors. I have lost 63lb on them and have had minimal side effects. I am much more healthy now that I was before I lost the weight. For me the risk of taking the jabs was less than the risk of staying obese. If you can do it without crack on. You do sound a bit bonkers with your conspiracy theory talk so maybe it’s not for you.

You’re completely correct,

what the poster is missing is the drugs force you to change your diet, assuming it was poor in the first place, as for many its portion control, too much fatty or sugary food makes you unwell, so people either change their diets or come off tne meds as they don’t work for them.

in addition fat people are fat, not stupid. Not greedy and lazy. Sitting gorging on burgers and donuts. Unsure of what to eat. The fat melting off as they inject. Changing your diet is a given. And food tastes different. Things taste much sweeter. The desire for the fatty sugary stuff goes completely

we already see it in retail and hospitality, more healthy options being offered, more protein based foods,

sp this people don’t change their habits, is nonsense, if they have poor habits and don’t change them they won’t stay on the frugs for more than a few weeks, as they’d be very unwell. Anyone successful, you know by default eats a clean and healthy diet.

It is a disease dear. The WHO says so. You cant just decide it isn't so you can keep your moral superiority intact.

I've lost 7 stone on mj and no food makes me ferl unwell. The difference id feeling full for longer and less food noise

OP's not been back then 🙄

Rationing - calorific value of rationed items including half a pound of sugar, a quarter pound of butter per adult a week, half a jar of jam/preserves each a month = about 1680 kcal daily.
Unrationed items (like potatoes, veg, bread, fish, fish and chips) took it up to a planned 3000 a day - and about 3500 for somebody in a manual occupation.
Pregnant women were able to increase their intake with milk/cod liver oil/orange juice etc.

There's even a record in Hansard to say pre war average daily intake was 3000 https://hansard.parliament.uk/commons/1947-05-19/debates/f738cdb5-6a0a-49de-9f68-1788f58ef7f0/CalorieIntake1934%E2%80%9338

Ok thanks for clarifying. WLIs do make it possible to lose weight without necessarily bettering those habits, but it's really important to spell out that people mostly weren't changing them anyway. The societal trend was the other way. Our eye was already a very long way from the ball.

Which means the appropriate, reality based comparison even just for that cohort isn't weight loss via healthier methods vs weight loss through WLIs. It's overweight/obese and unhealthy vs thinner and unhealthy. Thinner and unhealthy is better.

I'm less interested in hypotheticals (no offence like) but do want to hear more about why you think WLI usage is perpetuating the idea that people can’t help themselves but become obese. Ie a thing that's happening already. Nothing you've written has provided any evidence for that, or even really explained it.

I was obese, only just, at BMI 31. I don’t have any metabolic disorder, I just ate too much because I like food and drank too much alcohol. I don’t have any health conditions. I have no issue with taking Mounjaro, it helped me lose weight and I feel great. I don’t believe I’ve damaged my metabolism and I’ve improved my health. You don’t need to worry about me or other people in my situation. It’s a prescription drug that was prescribed by a medical professional. That’s good enough for me.

But that’s not right, it’s very rare any one has bad eating habits and can use the drugs successfully without changing them. You’d be sick as a dog. I thought this was common knowledge, any one on the drugs will tell you, too much fat or sugar are you in the loo, vomiting sulphur burps, overwhelming nausea, sore stomach etc,

its also absolutely nonsense fat people all have bad diets, sure some do, but for many it’s poor portion control, it was for me, and the others who are on the drugs, no one was inhaling McDonald’s and cadburys on the daily.

and nearly every fat person on them has tried every single diet they can and failed to keep the weight off, before going on the meds, it’s the last resort not the first.

this whole myth of fat people eating shit food and keeping doing so on the meds is just that, a myth, you only have to look at any of the threads on here or Reddit and it becomes immediately apparent nearly everyone eats healthy and gets ill if they don’t, which they don’t even want the bad food on the meds.

this view point is being put forward by someone who clearly takes issue with the meds being available or they have issues with fat people, either way it’s a nonsense and insulting view point that shows a complete lack of understanding of both obesity and the medication,

I can buy that the number of people who take WLIs and lose weight by eating less of the same poor diet is higher than zero, albeit they're possibly being given undue prominence in a discussion about society as a whole.

It's just that even if for whatever reason we focus on them in particular, they weren't improving those habits before WLIs came along either. I understand why people would like them losing weight through healthy lifestyle changes to be one of the options on the table. Would've been nice. But that doesn't override the fact that it wasn't happening and there's no evidence to suggest we were going to change that.

@Stormyrose That’s rubbish too! I mostly eat a heathy diet but once a month I have fish and chips! It’s wonderful and no side effects at all. You are allowed to have some meals with fat and sugar. I don’t crave snacks so my fat and sugar intake is pretty low but I do allow myself a treat every so often.

I’m not sure that it is (or isn’t!) important to spell out what was happening anyway. We’re all in the world and we all experience it in varying ways. My perception, based on a fair few people around me is that WLIs have made it easier for people to achieve what they want - weight loss, for whatever reason - without changing much in terms of behaviour. Your perception, based on your experience, may be different. Neither is right or wrong.

I’m afraid it’s all going to be hypotheticals as I don’t think there’s any objective data to evidence either position, but even from the thread there’s a few pp that are very much in the learned helplessness category, reporting that they are unable to control their thoughts or appetite without WLIs. There’s a clear sense of dependency there. Which is understandable , but let’s not pretend it’s not there.

And again, I’m not saying WLIs are bad or shouldn’t be available, just that they are now part of a messy picture in which structural
drivers of obesity have not changed.

I don’t think I agree that thin and unhealthy is automatically good, or better than fat and unhealthy. Overweight people who exercise are broadly healthier than thin people who don’t - this is evidenced over a few years, recent study reported in the Times here https://www.thetimes.com/life-style/health-fitness/article/bmi-accuracy-fit-long-term-exercisers-9h5x855jf

@LifeOnEnceladus just to jump on MoneyJo’s post I also strongly recommend The Hunger Game by Prof or Dr Yeo. It is incredibly interesting and helped me also make some sense of my own hunger and food issues. It’s available on BBC Sounds.

Yes, I’ve seen that. The wording is a little strange isn’t it? ‘The average calorie intake per head per day in 1934–38 was 3,000.’ Mathematically, that clearly doesn’t mean everyone was eating 3000 calories a day but of course the Minister wanted to make it sound like food was bountiful. 3000 a day might have been the right amount at a time when physical activity was higher. It’s certainly not right for most people now.

This is probably the most reliable figure and source:

1946 urban working-class household diet: 2,307 kcal per person per day.

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5a7f8e1940f0b62302690313/The_Urban_Working_-_Class_Household_Diet_1940-1949.pdf

@Allisnotlost1 Generally obese people don’t exercise and are not fit. They do have more health problems. Jabs help reduce weight and therefore most people are healthier. Many thin people are thin because it’s natural for them to be thin and at least they can get up and move!

Seriously you think a once a month disproves what I’m saying, ok do it daily , have a bad diet as is being put forward, eat it 3 times a day and come back and tell us you’ve no gastro issues. In fact just do it once a day. Then tell us how you can tolerate it,

If you want to talk about how things were pre WLIs, which obviously you do as you have, it's important to be accurate about that. In the context of this discussion, it means being clear that the group of people you mention weren't changing their habits through lifestyle improvement pre WLIs, and there was no indication that was going to change. Otherwise we'll blur the lines.

I didn't say thin and unhealthy was good, so there's nothing to disagree with me on there. It is, however, better than fat and unhealthy. Which is the relevant comparison. If there were any reason to think this was a choice between fat and healthy vs thin and unhealthy, that would complicate matters. There's not.

No, perhaps they were not - my premise is that WLIs are a further disincentive to individuals and systems alike, not the only one. I think I have been clear about that yet you keep making the same point.

Similarly, I said being thin and unhealthy is neither good, nor better than being fat and healthy. I’ve pointed to evidence on that and there’s plenty more. I agree it complicates matters, but you seem to be oblivious.

This makes no sense, the drugs have a signficant cost associated with them. No one is getting fat and relying on the meds to drop weight, that’s ridiculous. I understand some ones kid said it up thread, but grown ups don’t do this,

using meds is the last resort not the first resort. 80 percent t of people regain the weight they lost through diet alone. Two thirds of the population are over weight or obese, despite education, and fitness advice being made freely available

this is not a case of we didn’t have a problem, or we didn’t try to resolve the problem, or the problem was being resolved.

people are dying. Obesity is the leading cause of cancer. The nhs alone spends tens of billions a year on obesity relataed illnesses.

a very safe effective medication is now available to make our populations healthy. It’s a fantastic medical development.

pretending people will only get fat or stay fat due to the meds now being available is laughable. People are fat. 2 out of every 3 and it’s getting worse. And all efforts to stop that have failed.

You hadn't. Clarity required acknowledgment that a situation already existed where people were overweight with poor lifestyles, not addressing it and there was no indication they were going to. It's taken until now for you to spell that out. I think it's fine if you think they're yet another disincentive to add to all the other ones that had prevented any improvement in the first place and there was no reason to think were going to be addressed. One more on the pile.

On the second paragraph, you wrote that you didn't think you agreed with me about something I hadn't written and don't think. I don't actually think it's a relevant comparison in the first place, so have no interest in discussing anyone's views about it with them. It's not a does complicate matters, it's a would if things were different- but they're not.

My apologies, I hadn’t realised you were unaware that a situation already existed where people were overweight with poor lifestyles, not addressing it and there was no indication they were going to. I’m delighted that you think it’s fine for me to think my own thoughts though, thank you.

I’m afraid the verbiage pretzel of your second paragraph is beyond me. You are, I think, determined to argue meaningless points rather than engage with the substance. It is better to be fat and healthy, than thin and unhealthy, if you don’t wish to acknowledge the evidence on that, it’s up to you.

I’m actually cringing for you. Did you actually just ask for confirmation it was better to be healthy than unhealthy.??

look whatever demons you’re battling here is your business and no one else’s. But you’re coming across a bit desperate, trying to sound like you’re engaging in an intellectual discussion whilst asking ridiculous questions.

I hadn't expected such basic concepts to be so beyond you that you were reduced to calling them meaningless because you've backed yourself into a corner, but mmmkay. Guess it's either that or explain quite why you're so keen to insert comparisons about thin and unhealthy vs fat and healthy. It's not like that bears any resemblance to what's actually happening.

Very few people are going to bang out up to three hundred and forty (fifty with delivery charges, more if they need to buy additional supplies) notes a month and then sit there eating Kit-Kats.

🤣 I don’t think anyone is sitting there exclusively eating KitKats! But the evidence doesn’t really show an improvement in diet quality either. And as a pp said, why would it?

Most studies are small and obviously reflect the diet preferences of the patient population (ie large portions and/or calorie dense/nutrient poor foods). Mostly they show a reduction in overall intake, but nutrient deficiency. I AI’d the summary

• UK - n=38. Mean intake was 1,337 kcal/day. All participants below the fibre recommendation, 45% below protein requirements, and substantial micronutrient shortfalls were found. https://lifestylemedicine.bmj.com/content/1/Suppl_1/A1.2
• USA - CRAVE study, n=43 enrolled; 28 completed. Semaglutide/tirzepatide substantially reduced food intake over 24 weeks, but overall diet quality did not significantly improve. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC13334816/
• USA - tirzepatide RCT, n=55. Tirzepatide reduced cravings for sweets, carbohydrates and high-fat/fast foods, but didn’t increase preference for fruit and vegetables. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12515769/
• USA - tirzepatide RCT, n=114. Tirzepatide reduced food intake, hunger and cravings for high-fat and sweet foods. Again, fruit and vegetable cravings did not increase. Link
• USA - n=16,143. Adults eligible for GLP-1 treatment had poorer diet quality and greater micronutrient inadequacy, although differences were largely explained by waist circumference. This describes the population likely to receive WLIs, rather than an effect of the drugs themselves. https://jn.nutrition.org/action/consumeSharedSessionAction?JSESSIONID=8B076E65107378630CDBF43448FCD4F3&MAID=TwMJ5QwsO2fjn3rP%2FzTNDQ%3D%3D&ORIGIN=528091075&RD=RD&exp=m530hR8kZkWFrMZ4YxEPNA%253D%253D