Weight is something that I’ve thought about every single day of my adult life,” says Jennifer Blackburn*, a 49-year-old public relations professional in Toronto. Following decades of trying different diets and medications—and finding little success—in fall 2022 she started taking Ozempic, the diabetes drug that has become synonymous with celebrity weight loss.
“It has been life-changing,” she says.
US health-care providers wrote more than nine million prescriptions for Ozempic and similar drugs during the last few months of 2022, around the time Blackburn received her script. Some 890 million adults have obesity worldwide, and weight-loss drug sales are forecast to grow to as much as $100 billion by the end of the decade.
No wonder obesity medications are a hot topic. But there’s still mass confusion around who should take them, whether the potential side effects are worth it, and whether people who truly need them can access—and afford— the limited supply.
How do the new obesity drugs work?
Ozempic was approved by the FDA in 2017 for the treatment of type 2 diabetes. Once the manufacturer, Novo Nordisk, tapped into the drug’s added benefit of triggering substantial weight loss, it soon had another drug in the works: Wegovy, with a higher dose of the same active ingredient, semaglutide, was approved in 2021 for the treatment of obesity. The company also makes an oral form of semaglutide called Rybelsus for type 2 diabetes.
In addition to semaglutide, there is also tirzepatide, which is prescribed as Mounjaro for diabetes and Zepbound for obesity. (Again, the active ingredient is the same, but the drugs are prescribed under different names with slightly different doses.) Another diabetes drug, liraglutide, is marketed as Saxenda for weight loss. And dulaglutide is sold as Trulicity for diabetes management.
Denne historien er fra June 2024-utgaven av Reader's Digest India.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
Allerede abonnent ? Logg på
Denne historien er fra June 2024-utgaven av Reader's Digest India.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
Allerede abonnent? Logg på
ME & MY SHELF
Chitra Divakaruni is the author of 23 books including The Forest of Enchantment, Mistress of Spices and Palace of Illusions. Her latest book is An Uncommon Love: The Early Life of Sudha and Narayan Murthy.
RD RECOMMENDS-BOOKS
Hanuman Chalisa and More
Who's Getting Colon Cancer
With rates rising among younger people, testing should start sooner
25 Lessons That Last A Lifetime
Suggestions about life are a little like lottery tickets: You may collect a lot of them, but they rarely pay off. Yet if you are truly lucky, you receive a few words of wisdom that inspire you forever. That's called hitting the jackpot
A Symphony Of Irritation
In the 2022 film Tár, Cate Blanchett played a conductor who was affected by misophonia—an acute sensitivity to certain sounds. For Lydia Tár, Blanchett’s character, the clicking of a pen or the beat of a metronome was enough to drive her to distraction.
Is Poverty Alleviation Truly Possible?
We ask economist and Nobel laureate Esther Duflo
The Alpha Dog
To rescue lost animals, she climbs into places most of us avoid
Let's Say Yes!
What started out as a way to get my son to try new foods opened up a world of adventure for my family
Hey Dad, Can You Help Me Return the Picasso I Stole?
A painting went missing in 1969, then turned up at a museums doorstep. No one knew how or why—until now
Band of Survivors
Armed with his drum kit, a Holocaust survivor fights anti-Semitism one musical note at a time