The startups betting you can quit GLP-1s and stay thin

Some weight-loss companies are marketing Ozempic and Wegovy as a short-term holy grail. Doctors say it doesn't work that way.

- Jessica Mathews and Alena Botros

"Ozempic doesn't have to be forever."

It's a line that may appear on your social media feeds if you've googled how to lose weight, or read up on Hollywood's latest miracle drug: Ozempic. The pink ad, posted as part of a campaign on Reddit, Instagram, and Facebook in recent months by the $3.7 billion weight-loss startup Noom, shows the drug's blue syringe pen moving back and forth below a timeline that doesn't extend beyond a year.

What the ad promises is nothing short of the holy grail of the $90 billion U.S. diet industry, the cure that Americans, especially American women, have sought for generations and are willing to pay dearly for: a new, more slender you, hassle-free. Quick weight loss, then a return to your familiar life-thinner, healthier, and happier.

It's no wonder that, since this new class of appetite-curbing GLP-1 medications, including Ozempic, Wegovy, and Zepbound, burst into public consciousness, nearly $1 billion of venture capital dollars have been injected into the growing sector of weight-loss companies, which is now awash with startups prescribing the drugs, according to PitchBook data from the past year and a half.