Blockbuster GLP-1 drugs have transformed the lives of millions of people. Lately, they’re undergoing a makeover of their own.
Once promoted as tools to address obesity as a medical issue, GLP-1 drugs are increasingly being seen — and marketed — as a way to look and feel better generally. And, as the pioneer in the field, Novo Nordisk, in particular, has leaned into the shift.
In advertisements around the world, the company has trotted out slogans like “Live lighter” and “Summer Glow Up.” On its website, Novo no longer labels its treatment, Wegovy, as a “weight management” drug or “anti-obesity” medicine, but instead as a “weight loss” drug. And the company now often refers to the people who take its drugs less as “patients” and more as “customers”… [end quote]
I wonder how this marketing shift will affect insurance coverage. Health insurers pay for medical conditions, not for vanity. GLP-1s are expensive and few can pay out of pocket. That would tend to restrict the GLP-1 market to the morbidly obese with clear health impacts.
On the other hand, the market niche of overweight/ obese (not necessarily morbidly obese) people who can afford to pay out of pocket and are willing to use GLP-1s as a lifestyle drug (with potential beneficial health effects) may be significant. There are data-supported health benefits to losing 5% - 10% of body weight which is much less than morbidly obese people lose on GLP-1s.
As a Novo Nordisk shareholder, I’m happy to see their marketing campaign. NVO’s share price has been depressed lately due to slower growth, pricing pressure, and heavier competition from Eli Lilly.
Just reconfirms my thesis that people want the answer from a pill/injection instead of discipline and hard work. FWIW, my “summer glow-up” involves lifting, running, and sweating.
As a healthy eater my body makes enough GLP-1. Sorry I’m not contributing to your portfolio.
Eating right is not hard at all! People used to do it before the AgroIndustrial Food Complex took over.
The Captain
o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o
Eating is a lifestyle thing, isn’t it?
GoogleAI:
Yes, eating is very much a lifestyle choice rather than a temporary fix. [1]
Why Eating is a Lifestyle
Sustainable habits: Diets involve short-term restrictions, whereas a lifestyle focuses on long-term, daily choices that nourish your body. [1, 2]
Holistic wellness: What and how you eat connects directly to your sleep, mood, energy levels, and overall health. [1]
Mindful patterns: Building a balanced routine—like the approach taught by Eating is a Lifestyle—helps manage hunger without constant stress or strict rules. [1]
Now that I eat a healthy breakfast I have no hunger pangs all day long. My next meal is dinner after the Sun sets. Confession, this abstinence is usually interruped by a beer or two.
Well, the insurance companies are notorious for their unwillingness to part with the $$$bucks until they really have to (and oftentimes not even then)…so will routinely keep a tight grip on the purse strings until a disease takes hold and cannot be ignored. It’s an easy ruse to ignore the earliest of stages, especially when it can take decades for that early departure from healthy homeostasis to become an irreversible disease state. Since someone who’s playing host to an unsightly 20lbs or so of podge in their 20s or 30s isn’t likely to have the same medical coverage in their 50s, why would an insurance company’s underwriters bother to consider a somewhat pricy prevention tool when the real disease becomes a different insurance company’s problem?
Not that there’s anything wrong with vanity…it’s always been my prime motivation for weight management and body composition strategies…but it would be quite a help if insurance companies, along with the general public weaned themselves away from the concept of vanity pounds and viewed those early signs of insidious weight gain as the start of a long slide into metabolic dysfunction, and a precursor to the real serious consequences. Even if hard work and self discipline prevents the 20lb from becoming 120lbs or more, but doesn’t quite manage to get rid of it.
Surely no here still believes the notion that a roly.poly midsection is only a vanity issue?
Obesity in the young is a macroeconomic issue for this exact reason. The obesity-related diseases of “old age” like Type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease and cancer are occurring younger than in previous generations. Health care costs will increase faster than projected since these are all chronic diseases that are expensive to treat. Yes, cancer has become a chronic disease in many cases since the progress in chemotherapy can delay death for many years.
Wendy
It’s a bit irksome to me that so many folk are stuck in Past Tense Thinking mode and so willing to dismiss useful tools that, granted, were originally developed for the folk who were well and truly established in the disease end of the continuum. Even folk who ought to know better. I follow a couple of endocrinologists/obesity specialists who seem to have a decent enough take on prevention and the benefit of exercise and body composition on metabolic health. Regardless, they are pretty dismissive of the earlier intervention principle WRT GLP-1 receptor agonists at a not very overweight stage. At least at the moment. Based on the usual canard of there’s no evidence.
Another tool that’s being heavily promoted these days is the continuous read glucose monitor. Especially since OTC models have become available. I can see a role for use of these devices even in the pre prediabetes stages. Again objections based on lack of evidence (along with more fatuous ideas on creating unhealthy relationships with food etc) Well, reality is that these gizmos were initially developed for…and only studied in…type 1 diabetes. As such, there was no evidence for value in using them in type 2. And then folk started to use them and actually look and, lo…they were effective there too.
Numerous more examples if I felt like racking my brain some more…or lurching into using good old Google AI overview…but you get the drift.
Statistics is not a driving power. Statistics is a consequence. Find out what is driving that consequence.
In the 19th century there was no obesity epidemic, it started in mid 20th century. What happened? Why did people start to eat fattening foods? Why did people start to eat foods that make them sick?
I don’t do clinical trials, I’m a one specimen clinical trial. I ate myself sick. Once I quit the rat race I had more time for myself. I started reading and studying the subject. I started changing my eating habits. I started losing weight. My multitude of illnesses started to go away. Under medical supervision I stopped taking some eight drugs that were supposed to be for life. I haven’t seen a doctor for any of my bygone conditions for well over ten years.
It was not easy, as a friend used to say, “The only thing I cannot resist is temptation.”
Try researching the temptation that makes people fat and sick.
If I mention Ancel Keys and the government sponsored food pyramid you-know-who is going to pounce on me so I won’t mention them. Funny thing, now doctors on the Internet are saying that food recommendations were not good for you and that you should change your eating habits.
The good news is that once you learn to eat right the cravings for crap food disappear. Do read food labels! They list the poisons!
I can think of a better reason…because, as a valid reason/excuse for why folk in their 50s, 60s, 70s and beyond grew fat, it’s pretty much a nonsensical statement. It was the first time you made it and it’s stayed nonsensical regardless of how many times you’ve doubled down on it.
It does bring up a consequential point, mind…that of resorting to Google AI overview for opinions and insights into subjects where your fundamental understanding seems to be flawed. You’re bound to be at the mercy of “doctors on the internet” etc whose message has been deliberately chosen (by your Google prompts) to reinforce any strange ideas you hold.
I still say, though, that you really should give yourself far more credit for your own craptaculous choices…with honourable mentions to your uncle and dad for their plentiful supply of fancy cakes and desserts.
interesting reading about GLP-1 and its history. The original compound was too short acting to be of benefit. A doctor at the VA discovered some compounds in Gila monster slobber (I believe) that had a similar effect but was long acting which offered hope for some diabetes patients. Originally they were using this for diabetes but the side effects were what made it valuable for weight loss (Novo Nordisk acknowledges this info). So interestingly enough, Gila monsters have some history with GLP-1 and weight loss if you are interested in this type of information…doc
Interesting podcast interview with Lotte Bjerre Knudsen, the lead researcher who developed semaglutide (Ozempic) for Nova Nordisc.
Apparently, obesity treatments weren’t a popular field of study back in the 1990s. She describes as being the smallest group at conferences. Even her own bosses weren’t keen on the idea and wanted to shut down the project. But she knew she was onto something and just kept plugging away for 20 years.
One summer in med school ('89), I worked in the R&D department of Boots Pharmaceutical. The researcher I worked under was studying antidepressants. Had several new drugs in the pipeline but none really beat the “gold standard” of nortriptyline (at the time). One interesting side effect was found in a couple of the drugs - weight loss. More than what was attributed to becoming more active once depression was improved. Plus, didn’t have the bad side effects of the then popular Fen-phen treatment. I recognized one drug about 5 years later in a TV weight loss ad.
Back then, obesity treatments tended to concentrate on surgical interventions but these not so good antidepressants probably opened the door.
Yep. John Eng and his lab partner were research fellows in the lab where my husband did his sabbatical year (1980)…the late Nobel Laureate Ros Yalow’s lab within the Bronx VA. They were working on the naturally occurring compound in humans at the time. Being that this hormone is present normally in low concentrations and with a super short half life, their research at the time was pretty much going nowhere compared to dh’s very productive year working on secretin. Well, all I can say about that is that we aren’t the multimillionaires.
Yep. As I’ve mentioned a time or seventeen, what minimal faith I had in Google AI overview got a jolt when I asked it a question…and found myself as about the most authoritative source at that time!! From a post I’d made on this board (just about 2 years ago, give or take a few weeks) Probably gotten a bit better since…but how to tell if half the sources accessed are actually AI generated twaddle???
Still, when you see how the Googliers manage to get it wrong with the AI overview opinion to the fore…and so confidently too… on topics where you have a bit of a clue, it’s a useful heuristic when trying to assess their take on a topic where you dont!
I think you have to be more informed now than before the internet/AI deluge. At minimum have a high degree of suspicion. To quote Abraham Lincoln - “Don’t trust everything you read on the internet.”
