Episode 7
Ozempic and Wegovy, are they safe?
Hello, and welcome to another episode of Nutrition is the Key to Health, where I talk about nutrition, health, and everything in between.
I have been compelled to cover this topic in my blog, nutritionisthekeytohealth.com for a few months now, but I have held off. So, in this episode here on my podcast, I will touch on this ever so lightly on the subject.
The craze in the last few years has been drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy. This is a fad that probably began with extremely sick individuals and then was quickly picked up by the rich and famous and the cat was out of the bag so to speak. They began using these drugs and the results of these wonder drugs for weight loss spread like wildfire. But, are these drugs safe?
Disclaimer, I am not a physician, nurse, registered dietician, physical therapist, or mental health professional. This is my story and what I have done and learned over the course of my journey. If you plan to start a diet or exercise program, please get approval from your doctor.
Okay, let’s get into it.
Drugs for weight loss, are they safe? Let’s look at the macro view of these drugs. These drugs have a use of Adult Onset Diabetes 2. When they began administering these drugs, weight loss became a front-runner bonus very quickly, and soon, the market demand spiked for cosmetic weight loss and has grown exponentially.
I think all our lives, we will still be trying to utilize medication to help get us to the weight we want to be, instead of addressing our habits and diet. It is just our way. We would rather continue our way of eating unhealthy and damaging our bodies, instead of addressing the underlying issue which is our bad choices.
After all, when we look back there were drugs like Fen-Phen, which we saw the rise and fall of the weight loss industry in the late 1990s. The FDA began looking into the drug after several deaths occurred. Wyeth, the manufacturer of the drug, volunteered to remove it from the market, but only after the FDA strongly urged it to do so, due to complications like heart failure, and pulmonary hypertension just to name a few. The lawsuits began to mount, and a class action suit was born.
Now, in comes new stars like Ozempic and Wegovy. These are injectable medications. They hit the market and the news spread like wildfire across our nation. The rich and the stars began consuming this drug like it was candy. Then, it spread into the mainstream as a wonder drug for weight loss.
Sameer Khan, a gastroenterologist at John Hopkins School of Medicine, was quoted in an article that the generics Semaglutide and Mounjaro, are FDA-approved injectables that are utilized for adult-onset diabetes and weight loss. He stated that these drugs were hard to find and expensive. The cost of the drugs was around 10K a year, and may or may not be covered by insurance.
Researchers have admitted that they do not fully understand the long-term side effects, or how the drugs work inside the body. That should be our first red flag.
Let’s look at some of the known side effects of these drugs:
· Nausea
· Diarrhea
· Vomiting
· Abdominal Pain
· Constipation
· Flatulence
· Face and Butt sagging due to weight loss
· Gastroparesis (slowing of the digestive system)
· Hair loss
· Fatigue that cannot be improved by sleep
· Dizziness
· Muscle Loss
· Increased vivid dreams
· Suicidal Thoughts
· Increased Heart Rate
· Palpitations
· Worsening Eyesight
· Hypoglycemia (low blood sugar)
Rare but serious side effects are:
· Pancreatitis
· Kidney Disease
· Gallbladder Disease
· Thyroid C-Cell Cancer
· Small Bowel Obstruction (which can become life-threatening very quickly).
· Interactions with Anesthesia
The drugs are not recommended for the older adult population, ages 60 and up, due to the facilitation of increased muscle loss, which accelerates weakness, onset of frailty, and increased falls leading to fractures.
If you are experiencing increased heart rates and palpitations, you are urged to discontinue the drugs immediately.
Benefits may include:
· Weight loss
· Improved Liver Function
· Lower rates of stroke
· Lower rates of heart disease
· Lower mortality
Once you are on the drug, it will be a life-long drug. Once you stop it, you will quickly rebound to your prior weight or even more.
This is something I find very interesting. The manufacturing company, Eli Lilly, issued a statement reiterating that “Mounjaro and Zepbound are indicated for the treatment of serious disease and are not improved for, and should not be used for cosmetic weight loss”. Yet this is one of the primary reasons these drugs are consumed.
They had to of created these drugs for the sole purpose of weight loss because they knew, that would sell. Manufacturers don’t care about doing the right thing. They are manufacturing drugs that will bring money to the bottom line, and that is it. That is apparent when other diseases that are not a huge part of our world take lives each day, but there is not enough money in it to sink research dollars, so no one does.
So, you have a manufacturer issuing a public statement, not to use these drugs for cosmetic weight loss, which is why the majority of these drugs are utilized, and they know this. Could this be a foreshadowing admission that the companies now have some data that indicates increased mortality rates and they are getting ahead of the curve when the lawsuits hit? After all, they told people not to do it, so they cannot be held accountable for those that do, right? It is definitely something to ponder.
It should be noted that there are no significant amounts of clinical trials published on these drugs, so we do not know the long-term side effects, or have the data. That should be red flag number 2.
I have thought long and hard about these drugs and decided, I would not take this drug unless I had a very serious health condition like uncontrolled diabetes, or weighed 600 pounds. I would try this instead of bariatric surgery if I were younger. But to use this drug for a quick fix to get a body so I could fit into a size 4 again, nope, that would not be me. The obsession to push our bodies to be thinner and thinner, and by any means possible is insane to me. We have used illicit drugs, diet pills, bariatric surgery, cosmetic surgery, and now injectables.
As I said in one of my other episodes, I think we would take cyanide in a capsule if the doctor told us it was safe and we would lose weight. I think we have gotten out of control with this, don’t you? Of course, that is my opinion.
I would like to see everyone look at their diet, habits, exercise, and sleep. Make the changes you need to make for a healthier you. Add complimentary things like journaling, meditation, walking, and many more into your lives, instead of looking for that next best diet in a pill or injectable.
I will live you with this, one of the things I have learned in my many health struggles throughout my life is that all medication comes at a great cost. It’s not free. It can have benefits, but it can also kill. Please keep that with you as you walk your journey to a healthier lifestyle.
Until next time,
Alicia