Weight loss drugs that are the latest… ‘new’ thing to help in the battle of the bulge. January is a great month to discuss weight control. The holidays can be like a feeding frenzy. Many people have gained a few pounds during the holiday and would like to get them off quickly. The typical scene in a local gym is a huge surge of people suddenly exercising daily, trying to “work it off.” Every year, this crowd is mostly gone by February. That is the unfortunate pattern I see most years.
This year I have noticed an uptick in news articles about new weight-loss drugs. I have tried to research them, but the information is not how they affect people physiologically and I find that frustrating. They are collectively in a category labeled GLP-1 or GIP. Claims are made saying that the medications activate receptors in the body that decrease appetite and increase fat burning, and that is what promotes weight loss. It is also claimed that the drugs decrease inflammation and blood clotting. My first reaction is that this is a claim that has been made in the past about other things. Even the sellers of green tea extract in pill form make these claims. I was put on a diet at age ten, with amphetamines. Little, square pink pills. I remember my grandmother took them too. She said, “Those are great pills, they give you a little pep.” There was not much instruction about changes in diet or lifestyle. That would have been fifty-eight years ago. I have seen many diet fads come and go. Pills you have to take until you don’t want to be thin anymore are very suspicious to me.
The “innovative medication is a semaglutide”. The names these drugs have change if the drug is considered for weight loss verses for diabetes therapy. Ozempic is for diabetes, but the same semaglutide for weight management is called Wegovy. Tirzepatide is sold under the brand name Mounjaro for diabetes, but Zepbound for weight management. At this point, the drug is very expensive and is being tested by people who can pay for it. These people are motivated
subjects. Of course, the drug companies want it to succeed too, so they can try to get it considered essential and insurance will then pay for it. I offer that as a caveat to prompt close scrutiny of the numbers that the experiments are claiming for success.
With the drug Tirzepatide in clinical trials claims are, that sixty-percent of the patients taking it achieve a twenty-percent reduction in weight. In the placebo group, five to fifteen-percent of those subjects lost this amount of weight. The chances of gaining the weight back with lifestyle changes alone has been five, to ten percent or fifteen-percent with previously touted medications.
Other benefits are being noticed. The select trial findings claim that activating the GLP-1 receptor in the human body showed cardiovascular benefits even before significant weight reduction occurred. This might also be due to the drug’s effect on lowering blood clotting. This is similar to cholesterol-lowering drugs that contain an anti-inflammatory in that, some of the claims of the cholesterol lowering helping lower the incidence of heart attack are made without recognizing that a small dose of baby aspirin produces the same statistical change. It’s the anti-inflammatory that is helping.
About a month ago The Wall Street Journal had a lengthy article on the sale of the company that started marketing this kind of drug to a bigger pharmaceutical company. The enormous potential for this drug to be profitable must be alluring. On the same page, I saw an article that had comments and questions about how the U.S. has entire industries that benefit from obesity, and how these businesses might be affected. I had not realized how many businesses make a great deal of profit on people being obese. The first ones mentioned are related to diabetes. Insulin testing systems, insulin pumps, insulin drugs, dialysis after kidneys shut down, and all the sugar-free products that are sold to diabetics. Then there are joint replacements, back surgeries, cardiac surgeries, and bariatric stapling or “stomach binding”. Grocery stores were questioned as to whether people were buying less food in general and less junk food in particular. Add to this the advertising and sales revenue for the junk foods and the sugary, sweetened foods; how would they be affected? My next thought was, would any of these industries try to sabotage the weight-loss industry?
We know Weight Watchers was a huge success for a long time but, no longer thrives as it did. Atkins weight-loss products and the Dr. Atkins system for weight-loss seems effective for many people. Those who embrace the Keto diet approach seem satisfied with it - until they aren’t. A person can get tired of only eating protein. The most interesting system I’ve heard about, but have not yet researched, is intermittent fasting. This is a program where you don’t eat for eight to ten hours (or more) and then for the next four hours (or more) you can eat a variety of foods, with very few restrictions. When the eating period is over, you go back to fasting, drinking only water or no calorie liquids.
I can tell you there is caution on any diet. High protein diets are hard on the kidneys and you must drink a lot of water. Lower calorie diets like Weight Watchers must encourage eating lots of vegetables and small amounts of low-fat protein and fruit. The low-fat Weight Watchers system had to be monitored so that some fat was consumed. Fasting isn’t always a way to lose weight. I have a regular habit of fasting nine hours a day on Wednesdays and I can consume over 3000 calories in less than four hours and gain weight doing that idea. Long ago I tried Atkins. When the Atkins diet came out in the 1970s, the concept of eating high fat and protein was quite new. No portion control was advocated. As much meat, bacon, and fat as you wanted. The doctors who had been advising low-fat diets for years, about had heart attacks themselves, warning people they might have heart attacks. Yet Dr. Atkins documented 160,000 cases of people who lost weight and their cholesterol dropped and the heart risk factors also dropped. This scientific evidence was ignored. Even the stomach stapling or whatever other fancy label you want to give that surgery isn’t a given winner. Only
one in twelve people who get that surgery successfully keep the weight off. Only one in twelve. It takes lifestyle changes that you are willing to stick with for a lifetime. Portion control and making healthy choices have to become a way of living.
For naturally slender people, weight. control is not hard. For those of us who have a tendency to put on weight, it is a constant act of vigilance. I see this drug as the next money- maker, until people realize that although sixty-percent of the people in the clinical trials lost twenty-percent of their excess weight, that also means forty-percent did not. Those sixty-percent were highly motivated by very high price drugs that they have to keep taking to keep their weight managed. My guess is that even if insurance might decide to help pay for it, there will be caveats. They will only keep paying if you keep losing, or if you are diabetic, or if you join a weight management support group or something like that.
Last week I stumbled on a comedy routine called, “The Pool Man”. The comedian talked about his struggle with diet and exercise in a very funny, gentle way. Eventually he said he contacted a nutritionist that he saw once a week for a long time. He eventually started swimming five times a week. “Nutritionists don’t know more than you do. They help you follow the good advice you know.” In about six months, he had slowly dropped some weight and on his next doctor checkup, the doctor told him he was no longer Type II Diabetic. I think people have to come to terms with food on their own terms. Eating food that you know is bad for you is similar to taking drugs that are not good for you. You have to decide to be the boss of you and what you eat. You decide to think about why you are overeating or eating a certain food that is harmful for your health. There’s the psychological and emotional aspect of food that must be addressed and dealt with or no drug will help you lose weight and keep it off. I wish you all the best in your efforts!
This year I have noticed an uptick in news articles about new weight-loss drugs. I have tried to research them, but the information is not how they affect people physiologically and I find that frustrating. They are collectively in a category labeled GLP-1 or GIP. Claims are made saying that the medications activate receptors in the body that decrease appetite and increase fat burning, and that is what promotes weight loss. It is also claimed that the drugs decrease inflammation and blood clotting. My first reaction is that this is a claim that has been made in the past about other things. Even the sellers of green tea extract in pill form make these claims. I was put on a diet at age ten, with amphetamines. Little, square pink pills. I remember my grandmother took them too. She said, “Those are great pills, they give you a little pep.” There was not much instruction about changes in diet or lifestyle. That would have been fifty-eight years ago. I have seen many diet fads come and go. Pills you have to take until you don’t want to be thin anymore are very suspicious to me.
The “innovative medication is a semaglutide”. The names these drugs have change if the drug is considered for weight loss verses for diabetes therapy. Ozempic is for diabetes, but the same semaglutide for weight management is called Wegovy. Tirzepatide is sold under the brand name Mounjaro for diabetes, but Zepbound for weight management. At this point, the drug is very expensive and is being tested by people who can pay for it. These people are motivated
subjects. Of course, the drug companies want it to succeed too, so they can try to get it considered essential and insurance will then pay for it. I offer that as a caveat to prompt close scrutiny of the numbers that the experiments are claiming for success.
With the drug Tirzepatide in clinical trials claims are, that sixty-percent of the patients taking it achieve a twenty-percent reduction in weight. In the placebo group, five to fifteen-percent of those subjects lost this amount of weight. The chances of gaining the weight back with lifestyle changes alone has been five, to ten percent or fifteen-percent with previously touted medications.
Other benefits are being noticed. The select trial findings claim that activating the GLP-1 receptor in the human body showed cardiovascular benefits even before significant weight reduction occurred. This might also be due to the drug’s effect on lowering blood clotting. This is similar to cholesterol-lowering drugs that contain an anti-inflammatory in that, some of the claims of the cholesterol lowering helping lower the incidence of heart attack are made without recognizing that a small dose of baby aspirin produces the same statistical change. It’s the anti-inflammatory that is helping.
About a month ago The Wall Street Journal had a lengthy article on the sale of the company that started marketing this kind of drug to a bigger pharmaceutical company. The enormous potential for this drug to be profitable must be alluring. On the same page, I saw an article that had comments and questions about how the U.S. has entire industries that benefit from obesity, and how these businesses might be affected. I had not realized how many businesses make a great deal of profit on people being obese. The first ones mentioned are related to diabetes. Insulin testing systems, insulin pumps, insulin drugs, dialysis after kidneys shut down, and all the sugar-free products that are sold to diabetics. Then there are joint replacements, back surgeries, cardiac surgeries, and bariatric stapling or “stomach binding”. Grocery stores were questioned as to whether people were buying less food in general and less junk food in particular. Add to this the advertising and sales revenue for the junk foods and the sugary, sweetened foods; how would they be affected? My next thought was, would any of these industries try to sabotage the weight-loss industry?
We know Weight Watchers was a huge success for a long time but, no longer thrives as it did. Atkins weight-loss products and the Dr. Atkins system for weight-loss seems effective for many people. Those who embrace the Keto diet approach seem satisfied with it - until they aren’t. A person can get tired of only eating protein. The most interesting system I’ve heard about, but have not yet researched, is intermittent fasting. This is a program where you don’t eat for eight to ten hours (or more) and then for the next four hours (or more) you can eat a variety of foods, with very few restrictions. When the eating period is over, you go back to fasting, drinking only water or no calorie liquids.
I can tell you there is caution on any diet. High protein diets are hard on the kidneys and you must drink a lot of water. Lower calorie diets like Weight Watchers must encourage eating lots of vegetables and small amounts of low-fat protein and fruit. The low-fat Weight Watchers system had to be monitored so that some fat was consumed. Fasting isn’t always a way to lose weight. I have a regular habit of fasting nine hours a day on Wednesdays and I can consume over 3000 calories in less than four hours and gain weight doing that idea. Long ago I tried Atkins. When the Atkins diet came out in the 1970s, the concept of eating high fat and protein was quite new. No portion control was advocated. As much meat, bacon, and fat as you wanted. The doctors who had been advising low-fat diets for years, about had heart attacks themselves, warning people they might have heart attacks. Yet Dr. Atkins documented 160,000 cases of people who lost weight and their cholesterol dropped and the heart risk factors also dropped. This scientific evidence was ignored. Even the stomach stapling or whatever other fancy label you want to give that surgery isn’t a given winner. Only
one in twelve people who get that surgery successfully keep the weight off. Only one in twelve. It takes lifestyle changes that you are willing to stick with for a lifetime. Portion control and making healthy choices have to become a way of living.
For naturally slender people, weight. control is not hard. For those of us who have a tendency to put on weight, it is a constant act of vigilance. I see this drug as the next money- maker, until people realize that although sixty-percent of the people in the clinical trials lost twenty-percent of their excess weight, that also means forty-percent did not. Those sixty-percent were highly motivated by very high price drugs that they have to keep taking to keep their weight managed. My guess is that even if insurance might decide to help pay for it, there will be caveats. They will only keep paying if you keep losing, or if you are diabetic, or if you join a weight management support group or something like that.
Last week I stumbled on a comedy routine called, “The Pool Man”. The comedian talked about his struggle with diet and exercise in a very funny, gentle way. Eventually he said he contacted a nutritionist that he saw once a week for a long time. He eventually started swimming five times a week. “Nutritionists don’t know more than you do. They help you follow the good advice you know.” In about six months, he had slowly dropped some weight and on his next doctor checkup, the doctor told him he was no longer Type II Diabetic. I think people have to come to terms with food on their own terms. Eating food that you know is bad for you is similar to taking drugs that are not good for you. You have to decide to be the boss of you and what you eat. You decide to think about why you are overeating or eating a certain food that is harmful for your health. There’s the psychological and emotional aspect of food that must be addressed and dealt with or no drug will help you lose weight and keep it off. I wish you all the best in your efforts!
