There are TikTok hashtags with hundreds of thousands of followers, infinite column inches over celebrities’ waistlines and streams of media protection when trial outcomes come out. It’s uncommon {that a} new drugs will get a lot consideration. Then once more, it’s even rarer {that a} licensed drug causes secure and speedy weight reduction with minimal effort.
A yr in the past, most individuals hadn’t heard of semaglutide, a drug developed to deal with kind 2 diabetes round a decade in the past beneath the model identify Ozempic. Then, in 2021, it was accredited within the US as a weight-loss help beneath the identify Wegovy. The drugs could cause individuals to lose a whopping 15 per cent of their physique weight.
The influence of this new class of medicines may very well be unprecedented – probably bringing to an finish the world’s rising weight problems epidemic. “I don’t suppose it’s totally sunk in but,” says Jonathan Campbell at Duke College in North Carolina, who investigates how these medicine have an effect on the physique.
For one factor, Wegovy was simply the beginning. The following era of those medicine is in improvement and might be cheaper, simpler to make use of and, crucially, much more potent. What’s extra, rising proof suggests Wegovy and its ilk work higher when given at a youthful age, so docs are exploring their use in youngsters and younger youngsters. This raises the prospect of switching from weight problems therapy to prevention. “Now we have watched the weight problems panorama change dramatically over the past 40 years,” says Campbell. “Now, possibly we’re at a turning level the place that goes backwards.”
Why weight problems is on the rise
The rise in weight problems has been taking place since concerning the Nineteen Seventies …
