Treatments for longevity would also affect the various businesses that produce drugs & devices to help people with the problems of aging.
People on drugs like Wegovy are less likely to crave Krispy Kremes. And if they stay on the drug for years (unlikely at this stage due to restrictions on most insurance plans), their weight loss could help prevent all sorts of complications, like Type 2 diabetes. That could in turn mean fewer sales of things like insulin pumps and sleep apnea machines. And people who slim down could hit the cancel button on their dieting apps.
also:
All this is very hypothetical for now: Paying for the treatment of 100 million obese Americans would literally make Medicare insolvent at the drugsā current prices. Eventually, though, as data shows longer-term benefits that extend beyond weight loss, insurance coverage will expand.
These GLP drugs appear to work well at a significant price, and until we can overhaul the typical horrible American diet, itās the best we have. My concern is that even with a 15 kg weight loss from Ozempic, that still leaves many people obese and unhealthy.
I suspect people on Wegovy are going to keep eating donuts because the drug cancels out the negative effects of eating donuts. Or at least, the obvious negative effect, getting fat. I donāt know if those drugs keep you in good metabolic health - will you be a skinny diabetic if you eat poorly on Wegovy?
People on GLP1 receptor agonists report reduced āfood noiseā in their heads and cravings. I donāt know that itās been studied, but I would expect that even without the dietary counseling they get in the trials, people on these drugs will eat more healthily. At minimum, they will eat less garbage as a function of eating less food.
You say 15 kg of weight loss is common on Ozempic (low-dose semaglutide), but people on high-dose sema (Wegovy) lose 15 percent of their weight, and newer drugs in the class are even better. On retatrutide (a triple-hormone receptor agonist for GLP-1, GIP, and glucagon), people lost 24 percent of their body weight at week 48, with the trends pointing to more pounds to be shed:
My story with Ozempic is worse than others. Iām a professor in Texas with an MD from Mexico, and Iāve had type 2 diabetes for more than 20 years. I used metformin for the last two decades and I experienced some gastrointestinal side effects.
The main reason why I started injecting Ozempic in April 2023 was because it was only a once-a-week injection, and I was tired of taking a lot of medications twice a day for so long.
The burning pain in the back never disappeared. But in August, a worse burning pain in my genital area and buttocks appeared.
I noticed āpiecesā of skin on my toilet seat and on the tissue paper when I cleaned the area. I checked, and my genitals, anus, and buttocks were severely burned, some areas with charred skin. It was as if I was exposed to sunlight for days.
As far as Medicare goes, I do not know if it covers this medicine at this time. Does anyone have proof that Medicare covers it right now and for which patients?
Letās assume Medicare does cover the treatment and 100 million on Medicare want it. Can the US Govt buy the company or buy the treatment for a reduced value?
Anecdotes are completely worthless and anyone who thinks obesity is preferable to medication doesnāt have their priorities straight. Having too much fat mass is not merely a cosmetic condition, itās as hazardous to your health as smoking or being alcoholic. Do I have to post pictures of morbidly obese people literally rotting to death? Even if ozempic literally killed 1% of all patients, it would still result in a larger reduction in all cause mortality than not using it because obesity is just that bad.
MHO, what would be better is to figure out what is causing obesity, so then people could stop doing it (at least, some of them).
FWIW, I ran across a very long post recently suggesting one cause may be n6 oils (the āheart healthyā stuff we are advised to eat instead of butter). Does Linoleic Acid Induce Obesity? Part 1
Iām not saying itās true, but I still avoid vegetable oils & the things made from them (like salad dressing) like the plague. Iām sure that if I ate like my relatives I would be the size they are. For me, itās not genetics but eating style.
